moderngirly

Photos from my life

2012-01-01T20:44:00.000-06:00

Looking back on the year 2011, I honestly think it's been the best year of my life so far. I moved to a whole new place and met and got to know the best people. I challenged myself to do the things that made me scared or uncomfortable and am so much the better for it. Here is to 2012 and continuing to face my fears.

Here are some photos from just the last couple months.

Street Sayings

2011-12-23T12:32:00.001-06:00

In the London Underground

At the Tate Modern

On seeing the 100% perfect girl one beautiful April morning

2011-10-22T03:47:00.002-05:00

This is a beautiful, poignant short story by Haruki Murakami, a celebrated author whose books I should really get to reading when I have the time. Honestly, it's a shame and kind of embarrassing that I haven't read one of his books yet. This story is the basic inspiration for his latest book "1Q84", a giant tome at under 1000 pages.

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Haruki Murakami: On seeing the 100% perfect girl one beautiful April morning

One beautiful April morning, on a narrow side street in Tokyo's fashionable Harujuku neighborhood, I walked past the 100% perfect girl.

Tell you the truth, she's not that good-looking. She doesn't stand out in any way.

Her clothes are nothing special. The back of her hair is still bent out of shape from sleep. She isn't young, either - must be near thirty, not even close to a "girl," properly speaking. But still, I know from fifty yards away: She's the 100% perfect girl for me. The moment I see her, there's a rumbling in my chest, and my mouth is as dry as a desert.

Maybe you have your own particular favorite type of girl - one with slim ankles, say, or big eyes, or graceful fingers, or you're drawn for no good reason to girls who take their time with every meal. I have my own preferences, of course.

Sometimes in a restaurant I'll catch myself staring at the girl at the next table to mine because I like the shape of her nose.

But no one can insist that his 100% perfect girl correspond to some preconceived type. Much as I like noses, I can't recall the shape of hers - or even if she had one.

All I can remember for sure is that she was no great beauty. It's weird.

"Yesterday on the street I passed the 100% girl," I tell someone.

"Yeah?" he says. "Good-looking?"

"Not really."

"Your favorite type, then?"

"I don't know. I can't seem to remember anything about her - the shape of her eyes or the size of her breasts."

"Strange."

"Yeah. Strange."

"So anyhow," he says, already bored, "what did you do? Talk to her? Follow her?"

"Nah. Just passed her on the street."

She's walking east to west, and I west to east. It's a really nice April morning.
Wish I could talk to her. Half an hour would be plenty: just ask her about herself, tell her about myself, and - what I'd really like to do - explain to her the complexities of fate that have led to our passing each other on a side street in Harajuku on a beautiful April morning in 1981. This was something sure to be crammed full of warm secrets, like an antique clock build when peace filled the world.

After talking, we'd have lunch somewhere, maybe see a Woody Allen movie, stop by a hotel bar for cocktails. With any kind of luck, we might end up in bed.
Potentiality knocks on the door of my heart.

Now the distance between us has narrowed to fifteen yards.

How can I approach her? What should I say?

"Good morning, miss. Do you think you could spare half an hour for a little conversation?"

Ridiculous. I'd sound like an insurance salesman.

"Pardon me, but would you happen to know if there is an all-night cleaners in the neighborhood?"

No, this is just as ridiculous. I'm not carrying any laundry, for one thing. Who's going to buy a line like that?

Maybe the simple truth would do. "Good morning. You are the 100% perfect girl for me."

No, she wouldn't believe it. Or even if she did, she might not want to talk to me. Sorry, she could say, I might be the 100% perfect girl for you, but you're not the 100% boy for me. It could happen. And if I found myself in that situation, I'd probably go to pieces. I'd never recover from the shock. I'm thirty-two, and that's what growing older is all about.

We pass in front of a flower shop. A small, warm air mass touches my skin. The asphalt is damp, and I catch the scent of roses. I can't bring myself to speak to her. She wears a white sweater, and in her right hand she holds a crisp white envelope lacking only a stamp. So: She's written somebody a letter, maybe spent the whole night writing, to judge from the sleepy look in her eyes. The envelope could contain every secret she's ever had.

I take a few more strides and turn: She's lost in the crowd.

Now, of course, I know exactly what I should have said to her. It would have been a long speech, though, far too long for me to have delivered it properly. The ideas I come up with are never very practical.

Oh, well. It would have started "Once upon a time" and ended "A sad story, don't you think?"

Once upon a time, there lived a boy and a girl. The boy was eighteen and the girl sixteen. He was not unusually handsome, and she was not especially beautiful. They were just an ordinary lonely boy and an ordinary lonely girl, like all the others. But they believed with their whole hearts that somewhere in the world there lived the 100% perfect boy and the 100% perfect girl for them. Yes, they believed in a miracle. And that miracle actually happened.

One day the two came upon each other on the corner of a street.

"This is amazing," he said. "I've been looking for you all my life. You may not believe this, but you're the 100% perfect girl for me."

"And you," she said to him, "are the 100% perfect boy for me, exactly as I'd pictured you in every detail. It's like a dream."

They sat on a park bench, held hands, and told each other their stories hour after hour. They were not lonely anymore. They had found and been found by their 100% perfect other. What a wonderful thing it is to find and be found by your 100% perfect other. It's a miracle, a cosmic miracle.

As they sat and talked, however, a tiny, tiny sliver of doubt took root in their hearts: Was it really all right for one's dreams to come true so easily?

And so, when there came a momentary lull in their conversation, the boy said to the girl, "Let's test ourselves - just once. If we really are each other's 100% perfect lovers, then sometime, somewhere, we will meet again without fail. And when that happens, and we know that we are the 100% perfect ones, we'll marry then and there. What do you think?"

"Yes," she said, "that is exactly what we should do."

And so they parted, she to the east, and he to the west.

The test they had agreed upon, however, was utterly unnecessary. They should never have undertaken it, because they really and truly were each other's 100% perfect lovers, and it was a miracle that they had ever met. But it was impossible for them to know this, young as they were. The cold, indifferent waves of fate proceeded to toss them unmercifully.

One winter, both the boy and the girl came down with the season's terrible inluenza, and after drifting for weeks between life and death they lost all memory of their earlier years. When they awoke, their heads were as empty as the young D. H. Lawrence's piggy bank.

They were two bright, determined young people, however, and through their unremitting efforts they were able to acquire once again the knowledge and feeling that qualified them to return as full-fledged members of society. Heaven be praised, they became truly upstanding citizens who knew how to transfer from one subway line to another, who were fully capable of sending a special-delivery letter at the post office. Indeed, they even experienced love again, sometimes as much as 75% or even 85% love.

Time passed with shocking swiftness, and soon the boy was thirty-two, the girl thirty.

One beautiful April morning, in search of a cup of coffee to start the day, the boy was walking from west to east, while the girl, intending to send a special-delivery letter, was walking from east to west, but along the same narrow street in the Harajuku neighborhood of Tokyo. They passed each other in the very center of the street. The faintest gleam of their lost memories glimmered for the briefest moment in their hearts. Each felt a rumbling in their chest. And they knew:

She is the 100% perfect girl for me.

He is the 100% perfect boy for me.

But the glow of their memories was far too weak, and their thoughts no longer had the clarity of fouteen years earlier. Without a word, they passed each other, disappearing into the crowd. Forever.

A sad story, don't you think?

Yes, that's it, that is what I should have said to her.

Man

2011-10-11T13:21:00.003-05:00

The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, he said:

“Man.Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money.Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health.And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present;the result being that he does not live in the present or the future;he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

New Beginnings

2011-10-10T15:51:00.000-05:00

So now I have been at Cambridge for almost three weeks now. Sometimes I still will be walking around and have a jolting revelation that, yes, I am in fact living here. The beauty of the campus is truly surreal, and I am constantly in a state of wonder. The number of "firsts" I have accomplished in this time could overflow a bucket list. These three weeks have made me realize, however, just how hard it can be to pick up and go to a completely new country where you know absolutely no one. And I know most people have it much harder than I did. After all, they still speak English here, and I arrived almost immediately into a large social group in the same boat as me. Still, I go through moods almost everyday, where I swing wildly from absolutely loving it here and being terribly lonely and missing home, even though I'm not entirely certain where "home" is for me anyway. I think my problem is that I have a tendency to become a melancholy shut-in sometimes, although I've made a big effort to attend every single social event and talk to everybody I meet. It can be exhausting sometimes though, and I really look forward to making closer friends whom I can be comfortable and just hang out with now and then. For now, I'm still enjoying meeting new faces from all over the world and getting to know really interesting and intellectual people doing exciting things. There are so many events and gatherings and meetings happening all the time, and I feel like I need to go to everything to take full advantage of my time here. It is all a bit of a whirlwind. Sometimes I have to take a deep breath and steel myself before jumping back into the churning river (literally and figuratively!). So far, every time, it's been absolutely worth it.

I think this video and song captures my feelings rather well. The song is The Strokes - I'll Try Anything Once.

movies to get into the european mindset

2011-09-09T10:53:00.000-05:00

I still can't really wrap my head around the fact that I am moving to England for a year, and who knows what after! I'm very excited and also very nervous, having never been in Europe before, and never traveled without my family in my life. But, this is what living is all about!

So, while I'm stuck here in New Jersey/Texas, I'm trying to get myself in the European/travel mindset by watching travel movies that take place in Europe. Beautiful landscapes are always a plus. I compiled a large list and have gone through a good number of them. Here are some that I saw (no order):

Under the Tuscan Sun

Okay, so yes, this is a typical rom-com with all the clichéd setbacks, story arcs, and a main character that is a middle-aged-recently-divorced woman starting anew in a foreign land. With that being said, I found it enjoyable to watch and thought there were several real and emotional moments. Not that it is realistic, but there are actually scenes where Diane struggles to feel at home in her new surroundings instead of waltzing into the fairyland of "Tuscany," so I found those bits relatable. Diane Lane did a good job making herself somewhat likeable and sympathetic and the scenery in Italy was just beautiful!

A Little Romance

It was quite a surprise to see Diane Lane again but this time, so young! I really, really enjoyed this movie. The main characters are very cute and the storyline is definitely precocious, but it was all well done. In this movie, little Diane and a young french boy fall in love and run away from Paris to Venice, Italy, to visit the Bridge of Sighs so that they may kiss under it at sunset and have eternal love. Diane is cute, but the little French boy steals the show with his adorable accent and movie-star-mimicking ways.

Enchanted April

Beautiful depiction of a small castle in Italy, though it also paints England in very ugly, gray hues. Not much to say here...mostly I found this story rather silly and unbelievable, and most of the characters aggravating, but the images of Italy did really make me want to go there. This is also an older film, which made the movie look fuzzier and more washed out than its modern day counterparts, which I felt added to the whimsy and wistfulness of the movie.

Before Sunrise and Before Sunset

I've already mentioned these two movies often on this blog. Two of my favorite movies that I have watched many times before. They are beautiful, realistic, and poignant, and the first, Before Sunrise, has a wonderful feelings of spontaneity, being lost and wandering about in a foreign place, and the resulting feelings of intimate discovery. The two main characters meet on a train and decide to get off together in Vienna to spend one night talking and roaming the city before one must leave for America. The result and the connection they find with each other is really magical. Before Sunset picks up after nine years, when they reunite in Paris once again.

Im Juli (In July)

I recently watched this for the first time and thought it was fantastic. Very whimsical and improbable, and maybe a little too cheesy or sweet for some, but I thought it was a very fresh take on romance. A lot of getting lost, random adventures, and the exhilaration of letting things go and immersing yourself in strange places and the company of strange people. This movie is also quite funny!

Two For the Road

One of Audrey Hepburn's classic films, this movie was very well done and well acted by all, telling a story of a couple that fall in love, out of love, and back in love (sort of) while traveling in Europe. It was told with lots of vignettes and flashbacks, and quite a lot of cutting back and forth, while I found to be refreshing and served as a contrast between the years. It reminded me a bit of Blue Valentine the way it cuts back and forth between happy past and unhappy present, except it is not as depressing and painful. While I don't remember too much about the scenery, the earlier scenes in this film show the couple freely backpacking and hitchhiking their way about, while falling in love, without a care in the world, a nice fantasy for the traveler-wannabe. Audrey does a couple of other movies that are good and have a "Europe tourist-y" theme - Sabrina and Roman Holiday.

A Room With A View

Another classic, albeit with a very small portion of the film actually dedicated to travel. However, the scenes of Venice are amazing and shot very beautifully. Not to mention this is just a great and classic story. I have read the book as well and it is just as enjoyable as the movie. It was a treat to see Helena Bonham Carter so young.

Summertime

Personally, I didn't like this movie at all, despite the fact that Katherine Hepburn stars. I found her character to be juvenile and the plot to be very unnatural, with confusing twists. There were a lot of questions unanswered, and it was hard to understand why the characters do as they do. I cannot understand how she got an Academy Award for this as the movie really did nothing for me. However, there were lovely views of Venice (this is getting redundant. Okay, I guess I need to get myself to Venice and Italy in general).

Summer Lovers

I liked this movie purely for the beautiful, beautiful scenery of Santorini, Greece, which utterly convinced me that I must go to this magical place someday, as well as just the laid-back vibe of all the locals and tourists in the movie that are beaching, skinny-dipping, having a bonfire, or partying. Not to mention everyone in the movie was beautiful, tan, and skinny too (not to mention naked!). The plot (a three-way relationship) was almost besides the point for me.

May you have an interesting life

2011-08-18T22:10:00.000-05:00

from XKCD

Another website

2011-08-11T12:56:00.002-05:00

This is my personal blog, and kind of a catalogue or personal bookmark or scrapbook of things I find interesting. In the past couple months, however, I've been realizing how much I need a more "professional" place on the web for me to present myself. Also, I've been wanting to blog about things and issues related to my work. So I've started another blog at amyxzhang.wordpress.com. I will still use this blog to post quotes, poems, videos, photos, and other random internet artifacts I find.

The Second Coming

2011-08-01T17:52:00.001-05:00

“The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.”

- William Butler Yeats

from The Second Coming

Steve Jobs

2011-07-15T23:39:00.003-05:00

What are we, anyway? Most of what we think we are is just a collection of likes and dislikes, habits, patterns. At the core of what we are is our values, and what decisions and actions we make reflect those values. That is why it's hard doing interviews and being visible: As you are growing and changing, the more the outside world tries to reinforce an image of you that it thinks you are, the harder it is to continue to be an artist, which is why a lot of times, artists have to go, "Bye. I have to go. I'm going crazy and I'm getting out of here." And they go and hibernate somewhere. Maybe later they re-emerge a little differently.

-- Steve Jobs for Playboy 1985

I can't find the rest of the interview, although I remember reading it in its entirety somewhere. Here's a small excerpt.

Dostoevsky

2011-07-06T01:20:00.005-05:00

This past spring I took a course entirely for fun on Fyodor Dostoevsky, one of my favorite authors, if not my most favorite. The course almost made me wish I had decided to minor in comparative literature instead of economics, even if economics might be more useful. It's funnier when you think that my major is actually computer science (and my other minor is math). When I was in high school, I went through a glut of classic literature reading during my junior and senior year. I stormed through all of Jane Austen, Brontë sisters, and a smattering of Dickens, Hemingway, Gabriel García Márquez, Tolstoy, James Joyce, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Nabokov, Victor Hugo, etc., and generally, it was: the longer the book, the more I enjoyed it.

I loved every book I read immensely, especially The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky, which really spoke to me. However, I feel now that I went through all the books I did a little too quickly, and I was maybe too young to really grasp the novels deeper. That's why this course I took turned out to be such a treat. Not only did I get the chance to re-read one of my favorite books for class, but I could pore over every word and chapter to analyze, read famous criticisms, study his other short stories, read in-depth studies of the author and his mental state and convictions, and use all these to come to a better understanding of the symbolism and meaning Dostoevsky was aiming for.

Dostoevsky, I believe, is not an author for everyone. He writes about characters on the brink of insanity, twisted by fate and their own peculiarities, instabilities, and neuroses. After all, my final term paper was on the subject of suicide in his stories! However, I also believe there is a part of everyone that can relate at times to his characters and their desperation. Certainly, a lot of what he writes is extremely depressing, but in his later works especially, I find so many beautiful passages of love, spirituality, and hope. The Brothers Karamazov is one of the finest examples of both depression and enlightenment, if one can get through its length, and has many stories of human tenderness and suffering. One can only wonder what his two sequels would have been like if he had lived to write them.

With this in mind, I hope to go through other classics sometime this summer and gain new light on cherished stories by reading them over again with a slightly older mind.

Sheryl Sandberg

2011-07-04T16:45:00.007-05:00

I really enjoyed this article on Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook in the New Yorker, and was touched by the following excerpt describing Sheryl giving a commencement speech to Barnard College:

She described a poster on the wall at Facebook:

“What would you do if you weren’t afraid?”

She said that it echoed something the writer Anna Quindlen once said, which was that “she majored in unafraid” at Barnard.

Sandberg went on,

“Don’t let your fears overwhelm your desire. Let the barriers you face—and there will be barriers—be external, not internal. Fortune does favor the bold. I promise that you will never know what you’re capable of unless you try. You’re going to walk off this stage today and you’re going to start your adult life. Start out by aiming high. . . . Go home tonight and ask yourselves, What would I do if I weren’t afraid? And then go do it! Congratulations.”

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Here is the rest of her commencement speech, which I also found inspiring, as a serial self-doubter:

Thank you, President Spar. Members of the board of trustees, esteemed members of the faculty, proud parents, squirming siblings, devoted friends: congratulations to all of you. But especially, congratulations to the magnificent Barnard Class of 2011.

Looking at you all here fills me with great joy, in part because my college roommate, a member of your faculty, Caroline Weber, is here. Carrie, it means so much to me to be at your school, and in part because I work in Silicon Valley, let’s just say I’m not usually in a room with this many women. For the wonderful men who are here today, if you feel a little uncomfortable, we’re really glad you’re here, and no line for the men’s room. It’s worth it.

I graduated from college exactly 20 years ago. And as I am reminded every single day where I work, that makes me really old. Mark Zuckerberg, our founder and my boss, said to me the other day, “Sheryl, when do midlife crises happen? When you’re 30?” Not a good day at the office. But I am old enough to know that most of our lives are filled with days we do not remember. Today is not one of them. You may not remember one word I say. You may not even remember who your graduation speaker is, although for the record, Sheryl with an S. You won’t remember that it was raining and we had to move inside. But you will remember what matters, which is how you feel as you sit here, as you walk across the stage, as you start the next phase of your life.

Today is a day of celebration, a day to celebrate all the hard work that got you to this place where you can sit, kind of sweltering in that gown. Today is a day of thanks, a day to thank all the people that helped you get here, the people who nurtured you and taught you, who held your hand, who dried your tears. Today is a day of reflection. Excuse me, a little laryngitis.

As you leave Barnard today, you leave not just with an education, but you take your place amongst the fortunate. Some of you came here from families where education was expected and emphasized. Others of you had to overcome far more obstacles to get here, and today you become the very first member of your family to graduate from college. What an amazing accomplishment. But no matter where you started, as of today you are all privileged. You are privileged in the most important sense of the word, which is that you have almost boundless opportunity in front of you. So, the question is, what are you going to do with it? What will you do with this education you worked so hard to achieve? What in the world needs to change, and what part do you plan on playing in changing it?

Pulitzer Prize winners Sheryl WuDunn and Nicholas Kristof visited this campus last year and they spoke about their critically important book, Half the Sky.

In that book, they assert that the fundamental moral challenge of the 19th century was slavery; of the 20th century, it was totalitarianism; and for our century, it is oppression of girls and women around the world. Their book is a call to arms, to give women all over the world, women who are exactly like us except for the circumstances into which they were born, basic human rights.

Compared to these women, we are lucky. In America, as in the entire developed world, we are equals under the law. But the promise of equality is not equality. As we sit here looking at this magnificent blue-robed class, we have to admit something that’s sad but true: men run the world. Of 190 heads of state, nine are women. Of all the parliaments around the world, 13% of those seats are held by women. Corporate America top jobs, 15% are women; numbers which have not moved at all in the past nine years. Nine years. Of full professors around the United States, only 24% are women.

I recognize that this is a vast improvement from generations in the past. When my mother took her turn to sit in a gown at her graduation, she thought she only had two career options: nursing and teaching. She raised me and my sister to believe that we could do anything, and we believed her. But what is so sad—it doesn’t just make me feel old, it makes me truly sad—is that it’s very clear that my generation is not going to change this problem. Women became 50% of the college graduates in this country in 1981, 30 years ago. Thirty years is plenty of time for those graduates to have gotten to the top of their industries, but we are nowhere close to 50% of the jobs at the top. That means that when the big decisions are made, the decisions that affect all of our worlds, we do not have an equal voice at that table.

So today, we turn to you. You are the promise for a more equal world. You are our hope. I truly believe that only when we get real equality in our governments, in our businesses, in our companies and our universities, will we start to solve this generation’s central moral problem, which is gender equality. We need women at all levels, including the top, to change the dynamic, reshape the conversation, to make sure women’s voices are heard and heeded, not overlooked and ignored.

So my hope for all of you here, for every single one of you, is that you’re going to walk across the stage and get your diploma. You’re going to go out tonight or maybe all summer and celebrate. You deserve it. And then you’re going to lean way into your career. You’re going to find something you love doing, and you’re going to do it with gusto. You’re going to pick your field and you’re going to ride it all the way to the top.
So, what advice can I give you to help you achieve this goal? The first thing is I encourage you to think big. Studies show very clearly that in our country, in the college-educated part of the population, men are more ambitious than women. They’re more ambitious the day they graduate from college; they remain more ambitious every step along their career path. We will never close the achievement gap until we close the ambition gap. But if all young women start to lean in, we can close the ambition gap right here, right now, if every single one of you leans in. Leadership belongs to those who take it. Leadership starts with you.

The next step is you’re going to have to believe in yourself potentially more than you do today. Studies also show that compared to men, women underestimate their performance. If you ask men and women questions about completely objective criteria such as GPAs or sales goals, men get it wrong slightly high; women get it wrong slightly low. More importantly, if you ask men why they succeeded, men attribute that success to themselves; and women, they attribute it to other factors like working harder, help from others. Ask a woman why she did well on something, and she’ll say, “I got lucky. All of these great people helped me. I worked really hard.” Ask a man and he’ll say or think, “What a dumb question. I’m awesome.” So women need to take a page from men and own their own success.

That’s much easier to say than to do. I know this from my own experience. All along the way, I’ve had all of those moments, not just some of the time; I would say most of the time, where I haven’t felt that I owned my success. I got into college and thought about how much my parents helped me on my essays. I went to the Treasury Department because I was lucky to take the right professor’s class who took me to Treasury. Google, I boarded a rocket ship that took me up with everyone else.

Even to this day, I have those moments. I have those moments all the time, probably far more than you can imagine I would. I know I need to make the adjustments. I know I need to believe in myself and raise my hand, because I’m sitting next to some guy and he thinks he’s awesome. So, to all of you, if you remember nothing else today, remember this: You are awesome. I’m not suggesting you be boastful. No one likes that in men or women. But I am suggesting that believing in yourself is the first necessary step to coming even close to achieving your potential.

You should also know that there are external forces out there that are holding you back from really owning your success. Studies have shown—and yes, I kind of like studies—that success and likeability are positively correlated for men and negatively correlated for women. This means that as men get more successful and powerful, both men and women like them better. As women get more powerful and successful, everyone, including women, likes them less.

I’ve experienced this firsthand. When I first joined Facebook, there was a well-read blog out in the Valley that devoted some incredibly serious pixels to trashing me. Anonymous sources called me a liar, two-faced, about to ruin Facebook forever. I cried some when I was alone, I lost a bunch of sleep. Then I told myself it didn’t matter. Then everyone else told me it didn’t matter, which just reminded me of one thing: they were reading it too. I fantasized about all kinds of rejoinders, but in the end, my best and only response was just to do my job and do it well. When Facebook’s performance improved, the trash talk went away.

Do I believe I was judged more harshly because of my double-Xs? Yes. Do I think this will happen to me again in my career? Sure. I told myself that next time I’m not going to let it bother me, I won’t cry. I’m not sure that’s true. But I know I’ll get through it. I know that the truth comes out in the end, and I know how to keep my head down and just keep working.

If you think big, if you own your own success, if you lead, it won’t just have external costs, but it may cause you some personal sacrifice. Men make far fewer compromises than women to balance professional success and personal fulfillment. That’s because the majority of housework and childcare still falls to women. If a heterosexual couple work full time, the man will do—the woman, sorry—the woman will do two times the amount of housework and three times the amount of childcare that her husband will do. From my mother’s generation to mine, we have made far more progress making the workforce even than we have making the home even, and the latter is hurting the former very dramatically. So it’s a bit counterintuitive, but the most important career decision you’re going to make is whether or not you have a life partner and who that partner is. If you pick someone who’s willing to share the burdens and the joys of your personal life, you’re going to go further. A world where men ran half our homes and women ran half our institutions would be just a much better world.

I have a six-year-old son and a three-year-old daughter. I want more choices for both of them. I want my son to have the choice to be a full partner not just at work, but at home; and I want my daughter to have a choice to do either. But if she chooses work, to be well-liked for what she accomplishes. We can’t wait for the term “work/life balance” to be something that’s not just discussed at women’s conferences.

Of course not everyone wants to jump into the workforce and rise to the top. Life is going to bring many twists and turns, and each of us, each of you, have to forge your own path. I have deep respect for my friends who make different choices than I do, who choose the really hard job of raising children full time, who choose to go part time, or who choose to pursue more nontraditional goals. These are choices that you may make some day, and these are fine choices.

But until that day, do everything you can to make sure that when that day comes, you even have a choice to make. Because what I have seen most clearly in my 20 years in the workforce is this: Women almost never make one decision to leave the workforce. It doesn’t happen that way. They make small little decisions along the way that eventually lead them there. Maybe it’s the last year of med school when they say, I’ll take a slightly less interesting specialty because I’m going to want more balance one day. Maybe it’s the fifth year in a law firm when they say, I’m not even sure I should go for partner, because I know I’m going to want kids eventually.

These women don’t even have relationships, and already they’re finding balance, balance for responsibilities they don’t yet have. And from that moment, they start quietly leaning back. The problem is, often they don’t even realize it. Everyone I know who has voluntarily left a child at home and come back to the workforce—and let’s face it, it’s not an option for most people. But for people in this audience, many of you are going to have this choice. Everyone who makes that choice will tell you the exact same thing: You’re only going to do it if your job is compelling.

If several years ago you stopped challenging yourself, you’re going to be bored. If you work for some guy who you used to sit next to, and really, he should be working for you, you’re going to feel undervalued, and you won’t come back. So, my heartfelt message to all of you is, and start thinking about this now, do not leave before you leave. Do not lean back; lean in. Put your foot on that gas pedal and keep it there until the day you have to make a decision, and then make a decision. That’s the only way, when that day comes, you’ll even have a decision to make.

What about the rat race in the first place? Is it worthwhile? Or are you just buying into someone else’s definition of success? Only you can decide that, and you’ll have to decide it over and over and over. But if you think it’s a rat race, before you drop out, take a deep breath. Maybe you picked the wrong job. Try again. And then try again. Try until you find something that stirs your passion, a job that matters to you and matters to others. It is the ultimate luxury to combine passion and contribution. It’s also a very clear path to happiness.

At Facebook we have a very broad mission. We don’t just want you to post all your pictures of tonight up there and use Facebook to keep in touch, even though we want that, so do a lot of that. We want to connect the whole world. We want to make the whole world more open and more transparent. The one thing I’ve learned working with great entrepreneurs—Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook, Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Google—that if you want to make a difference, you better think big and dream big, right from day one.
We try at Facebook to keep all of our employees thinking big all day. We have these posters in red we put around the walls. One says, “Fortune favors the bold.” Another says, “What would you do if you weren’t afraid?” That question echoes Barnard alum Anna Quindlen, who said that she majored in unafraid. Don’t let your fears overwhelm your desire. Let the barriers you face—and there will be barriers—be external, not internal. Fortune does favor the bold, and I promise that you will never know what you’re capable of unless you try.

You’re going to walk off this stage today and you’re going to start your adult life. Start out by aiming high. Like everyone here, I have great hopes for the members of this graduating class. I hope you find true meaning, contentment and passion in your life. I hope that you navigate the hard times and you come out with greater strength and resolve. I hope that whatever balance you seek, you find it with your eyes wide open. And I hope that you—yes, you—each and every one of you have the ambition to run the world, because this world needs you to run it. Women all around the world are counting on you. I’m counting on you.

I know that’s a big challenge and responsibility, a really daunting task, but you can do it. You can do it if you lean in. So go home tonight and ask yourselves, “What would I do if I weren’t afraid?” And then go do it. Congratulations, 2011.

The cosmos is also within us

2011-07-02T19:15:00.004-05:00

The beauty of a living thing is not the atoms that go into it
but the way those atoms are put together.

The cosmos is also within us. We're made of star stuff.
We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.

Across the sea of space the stars are other suns.
We have traveled this way before and there is
much to be learned.

--Carl Sagan

Here is a rather hilariously cheesy but heartfelt attempt to transform the above words (and many more) into music.

Toni Morrison

2011-06-22T20:41:00.015-05:00

"I know that happiness has been the real, if covert, goal of your labors here. I know that it informs your choice of companions, the profession you will enter, but I urge you, please don’t settle for happiness. It’s not good enough. Of course, you deserve it. But if that is all you have in mind—happiness—I want to suggest to you that personal success devoid of meaningfulness, free of a steady commitment to social justice, that’s more than a barren life, it is a trivial one. It’s looking good instead of doing good."

-- Toni Morrison

I loved Toni Morrison's commencement speech to Rutgers Class of 2011. Not only were her words beautiful and meaningful, she spoke very lyrically and with both gravity, weighing her words, and a musical lilt. I have not read any of her works but plan on reading Beloved this summer. The full video of the speech can be found here and the rest of the transcript can be found here.

Pictures from Bonnaroo

2011-06-18T11:00:00.010-05:00

pictures from the ride from New Jersey to Tennessee and back:

Top 5 shows at Bonnaroo:

-The Strokes

-Deerhunter

-Arcade Fire

-Iron & Wine

-My Morning Jacket

Top 5 moments at Bonnaroo:

-Parachuters and tiny blinking LED lights in the sky that look like glitter/fairy dust while waiting for Arcade Fire

-Arcade Fire's Encore: everyone singing along to Wake Up and then the best song of all: Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains) - I was really hoping they would play this!

-Middle of Deerhunter's set: fearing death from a very rowdy mosh pit, experiencing brain meltage from the wall of music, and my first concert tears

-Dancing in the HUGE sea of glittery, glowstick-y people at Bassnectar

-Widespread Panic's amazing light show coupled with dozens of little lanterns floating away in the sky

Will not miss:

-portos

-the 7 hour crawl of maybe 2 miles to get in the grounds

-waking up suffocating and sweating in my tent every morning

-being dirty 30 seconds after washing thanks to enormous dust clouds

-bug-bites, intense heat, super cold and wet nights, and sunburns!

Top 5 memorable moments from the road trip:

-Near death experience ascending Cave Mountain Lake Road (??) - a narrow, rocky, unpaved road winding up and down the mountains with no railings to catch our imminent fall - Julian Casablancas singing "dooon't gooooo that way" on the radio as we turned onto this road

-An exact replica of Stonehenge made entirely of Styrofoam in the middle of Virginia

-A delicious authentic Korean diner in Natural Bridge, VA and the girls that were taking pictures of everything (omg a sewer!)

-Driving by a juvenile detention facility in the middle of nowhere on the way to our "campsite" and the general feeling of horror entering this initially deserted "campground", the warning of the camp warden that there was no cell phone service and to not chop off our legs, coupled with the realization that I actually hate camping

-Gorgeous views from Skyline Dr and the sighting of a mama bear and her three cubs!

The Tree of Life

2011-06-03T12:54:00.005-05:00

Going to see this in New York tonight at the Lincoln Center! I can't wait; the trailer gives me all sorts of goosebumps! What looks like overarching, life-encompassing themes and breathtaking imagery are all reminding me of The Fountain.

----------------------------

OK, back from the movie, and....wow. All I know for sure is I definitely have to go watch this movie again. The mistake I made the first time around was going into this movie, thinking that it would be a movie, when it really isn't like any movie I've ever seen, and thus, can't really be judged along with other typical movies. Unlike conventional films, it doesn't really have that much in way of a plot. Instead I would call it a series of mediations or musings on life, love, the universe, God, and time, complemented with beautiful, breathtaking shots of nature, the cosmos, childhood, and Malick's interpretation of the beginning and end of time, all set to a momentous soundtrack. In this way, I feel as if the movie is meant as a guide for the audience to gauge their own personal inner conflicts and spend two hours in an idealized setting - bombarded with awe-inspiring pictures and soaring music - to seriously ponder and come to terms with their own unanswered questions. I would not say the movie was entertaining, or enjoyable, or comprehensible, but I don't really regard that as a bad thing. A lot of the time, I did feel frustrated, confused, and conflicted. But I think this may have been because I was constantly struggling to watch it as if it were just another movie, looking for plot clues or hints at what the director was trying to convey. Looking back, I see it as an exercise to immerse ourselves in the Big questions, the kind we always asked and wondered at as children but have thought less and less about as we grew.

Aquarium

2011-05-29T21:14:00.001-05:00

Beautiful. I wish I saw this when I was in Japan.

Pictures from the Met

2011-05-23T12:44:00.006-05:00

I visited the Met for the first time the other day (and also unrelated-ly had my first bite of Shake Shack across the park!) Although I could not take any pictures to show, the Alexander McQueen exhibit was a must-see: astonishing, terrifying, romantic, and just beautiful. These were my favorite dresses on display:

This is the Oyster Dress but I like to call it the Sea Foam dress because of this absolutely beautiful picture, where she looks like she has just risen from the deep, still covered in the tendrils and foam of the ocean.

Sunshine Days and Foggy Nights

2011-05-06T13:29:00.003-05:00

I was born to catch dragons in their dens
And pick flowers
To tell tales and laugh away the morning
To drift and dream like a lazy stream
And walk barefoot across sunshine days.

I was born to find goblins in their caves
And chase moonlight
To see shadows and seek hidden rivers
To hear the rain fall on dry leaves
And chat a bit with death across foggy nights.

I was born to rub my hands in dirt
And walk green hills
To plant corn and make bread
To build a house strong against the wind
And to live free across sunshine days.

I was born to watch owls in dark forests
And hear coyotes cry
To feel trees tremble and the grass sleep
To taste cold air and smell the damp earth
And watch ghostly shapes disappear across foggy nights.

I was born to love a man wrapped in sunshine
And dressed in fog
To make a pact on a high hill
Ratified centuries ago by the sun
To walk together through sunshine days and foggy nights.

-- James Kavanaugh

------------------------

Summer is beginning... I have nothing planned, nothing figured out, and nothing to do, which is a strange, exhilarating, and scary feeling.

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond

2011-04-24T22:33:00.006-05:00

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond

any experience,your eyes have their silence:

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though i have closed myself as fingers,

you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens

(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and

my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,

as when the heart of this flower imagines

the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals

the power of your intense fragility:whose texture

compels me with the color of its countries,

rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes

and opens;only something in me understands

the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)

nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

e. e. cummings

---------------------

This poem plays a small but poignant part in the movie, Hannah and Her Sisters, directed by Woody Allen. It is a great, poignant movie, with lots of wry and ironic humor, plenty of witty dialogue, great classic music, and a love of New York, with lots of scenes and lovely shots of Central Park, the Met Opera, and Columbia. A great deal of Woody Allen's movies are just like that - Manhattan, Alice, Annie Hall, among others - in fact they're all kind of the same, with Woody Allen and Mia Farrow playing themselves usually and long sweeping shots of the city, which is why I guess I like all of them. It is easy for me to fall in with his New Yorker neuroticism, with existential crises and silly characters caught up in their little problems, like in Seinfeld.

It's so funny how close I was to moving to New York myself, about to put down the security deposit for an apartment near Columbus Circle, so close to Central Park. I spent the day there, when I went to see the apartment for the first time, and walked from the bottom all the way up Central Park, talking the whole time and visualizing myself walking there everyday. Now all of a sudden, I find myself preparing to move to England for a year and who knows what after! All I can visualize yet is rainy majestic castles and sweeping hillsides a la Pride and Prejudice and black capes and big banners like in Harry Potter. I have no idea what I will actually encounter, but I am very excited. No matter what though, I do resolve to live in NYC for a few years of my life at the least, someday.

2011-04-22T18:23:00.004-05:00

In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different.

-- Coco Chanel

Home

2011-04-05T17:13:00.006-05:00

Home

Returning to earth after his life

of weightlessness, the astronaut cannot

lift the small bouquet of flowers the child gives him.

He cannot raise his head off the pillow, pulled down

by the gravity of a dream.

He remembers nothing, no sound,

in the absolute zero of deep space,

the wild pounding of his baffled heart. He lifted

a building in one hand and a pencil in the other.

This was what he wanted: the world

like a worn stone cast into the water.

He wanted to break the promise of the body

to the earth, to stop the long descent of everyone

he loved under the ground. He wanted

to rise, an angel

in a paradise of exact data.

He spills his milk on his shirt. The earth

has darkness, and then light. The earth has birds

bickering over the last seeds. His fork slips

clattering on the plate. The road is shining.

The magnolia is shameless in the rain.

--John C. Witte

Where do I begin?

2011-04-05T17:09:00.003-05:00

Now they are through with me

2011-02-24T23:37:00.002-06:00

I have gotten really obsessed with this song as of late. It is so beautiful and so absolutely depressing. The video is just so much more poignant looking at the singer, Bradford Cox, with his sunken face, knowing he has Marfan Syndrome.

Take my hand and pray with me

My final days in company
The devil now has come for me
And helicopters circling the scene

And I pray for rest
Could you pray for us?
We know he loves you the best
We know he loves you the best

The light's inside my cave
I'm tired of my cave

Oh, these drugs, they play on me these terrible ways
They don't pay like they used to pay
I used to make it day to day

No one cares for me
I keep no company
I have minimal needs
And now they are through with me

Now they are through with me

---------------

The inspiration for the song came from a short story by Dennis Cooper, written as a news article/short biography. I'm unsure if this story is true or not. It's really depressing stuff, so I'm not going to post it here. Scroll down until you get to the blurb about Dima.

bonnaroo 2011

2011-02-24T23:27:00.005-06:00

I'm so excited that I'm going to Bonnaroo again this year!! The last time I went (in '09), I had some of the most amazing, terrifying, and memorable experiences ever, including monsoons, dancin' with balloons, falling asleep in random places, creepy mountain fog, tent fiascoes, and 24hr/day MUSIC. This year, I am so SO excited to see:

The Strokes, Explosions in the Sky, Iron & Wine, Beirut, Arcade Fire, Girl Talk, School of Seven Bells, Ratatat, the Decemberists, and Deerhunter

Yea, wow. The only way it could get better for me is if Radiohead, or Belle & Sebastian, or Sigur Ros were announced as surprise performers (I wish!).

Time-Tested Beauty Tips!

2011-01-31T23:11:00.006-06:00

For attractive lips, speak words of kindness.

For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.

For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.

For beautiful hair, let a child run his or her fingers through it once a day.

For poise, walk with the knowledge you'll never walk alone.

People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; Never throw out anybody.

Remember, If you ever need a helping hand, you'll find one at the end of your arm.

As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.

The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, the figure that she carries, or the way she combs her hair. The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides.

The beauty of a woman is not in a facial mole, but true beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul. It is the caring that she lovingly gives, the passion that she shows, and the beauty of a woman with passing years only grows!

--Sam Levenson (and incorrectly attributed to Audrey Hepburn)

perfect love mixtape

2011-01-13T23:17:00.005-06:00

Or, in actuality, the perfect love mix-CD - which doesn't sound nearly as nostalgic so I won't use it. So yes, anyway, this last week I've been trying to compile my perfect mixtape, based around love. The only rules I gave myself were: no more than one song for every band, and I only had 80 minutes to burn. This is what I came up with (in order):

Gorillaz - On Melancholy Hill

Guillemots - Made Up Love Song #43

Animal Collective - Summertime Clothes

Peter Bjorn & John - Start to Melt

Thom Yorke - Atoms For Peace (Four tet remix)

Liars - The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack

Mazarin - Another One Goes By

Harlem Shakes - Sunlight

The Dirty Projectors - Two Doves

Cass McCombs - You Saved My Life

Bon Iver - Blood Bank

Regina Spector - Real Love (John Lennon Cover)

Aphex Twin - Avril 14th

Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks

Tune-Yards - Sunlight

School of Seven Bells - Heart is Strange (Remix)

The National - Slow Show

Belle & Sebastian - Piazza, New York Catcher

The Wave Pictures - I Love You Like a Madman

Yeasayer - I Remember

Ola Podrida - Photo Booth

In total, it came to about 79 and something minutes. Of course, this mixtape is personal to me and who I am giving it to, and I made attempts to pick songs that I hoped my receiver would like, which meant taking out some songs that I liked but that he probably wouldn't. This generally meant that I threw out a lot of songs that I felt were too cheesy for him, also some slow songs I thought he'd find boring. Note: I did leave quite a few slow songs in the mixtape to break up rhythm, and because I couldn't bear to take them off. Other songs had lyrics that didn't completely fit the theme (though emotionally they were right). Still more I really wish I could have fit in...that's for the next time I do this.

These were the songs that almost made the cut:

Yo La Tengo - Our Way to Fall

Feist - Mushaboom

Stars - My Favourite Book

Shirley Bassey - Where Do I Begin

Looper - These Things

White Denim - Home Together

Sunset Rubdown - Us Ones In Between

Beirut - Postcards from Italy

Girls - Hellhole Ratrace

Graffiti6 - Free

Ben Folds - The Luckiest

Cass McCombs - Dreams Come True Girl

The Decemberists - Red Right Ankle

Explosions in the Sky - Your Hand in Mine

Ingrid Michaelson - The Way I Am

Iron & Wine - Naked As We Came

The Beatles - Here, There, and Everywhere

Animal Collective - The Purple Bottle

Social Animal

2011-01-11T21:28:00.006-06:00

"I believe we inherit a great river of knowledge, a flow of patterns coming from many sources. The information that comes from deep in the evolutionary past we call genetics. The information passed along from hundreds of years ago we call culture. The information passed along from decades ago we call family, and the information offered months ago we call education. But it is all information that flows through us. The brain is adapted to the river of knowledge and exists only as a creature in that river. Our thoughts are profoundly molded by this long historic flow, and none of us exists, self-made, in isolation from it."

“And though history has made us self-conscious in order to enhance our survival prospects, we still have deep impulses to erase the skull lines in our head and become immersed directly in the river. I’ve come to think that flourishing consists of putting yourself in situations in which you lose self-consciousness and become fused with other people, experiences, or tasks. It happens sometimes when you are lost in a hard challenge, or when an artist or a craftsman becomes one with the brush or the tool. It happens sometimes while you’re playing sports, or listening to music or lost in a story, or to some people when they feel enveloped by God’s love. And it happens most when we connect with other people. I’ve come to think that happiness isn’t really produced by conscious accomplishments. Happiness is a measure of how thickly the unconscious parts of our minds are intertwined with other people and with activities. Happiness is determined by how much information and affection flows through us covertly every day and year."

From the article, Social Animal by David Brooks:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/01/17/110117fa_fact_brooks#ixzz1AmvK5PsQ

I loved this passage (a speech made by a neuroscientist in the article) and I loved this article. It was beautifully written, clever, and poignant, pointing out how much humans fundamentally need the contact of others and how immensely we strive for the love of others in every unconscious little move we make.

The More Loving One

2010-12-23T02:54:00.006-06:00

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.
How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.
Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.
Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

W.H. Auden

Liu Xiaobo

2010-12-10T21:42:00.003-06:00

Latest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Liu Xiaobo is serving an 11-year prison sentence in China. Read at the Peace Prize Ceremony was his statement before his trial. I found it very moving, especially the part where he talks about his love for his wife.

Dec. 23, 2009:

June 1989 was the major turning point in my 50 years on life’s road. Before that, I was a member of the first group of students after restoration of the college entrance examination after the Cultural Revolution (1977); my career was s smooth ride from undergraduate to grad student through to Ph.D.
After graduation I stayed on as a lecturer at Beijing Normal University. On the podium, I was a popular teacher, well received by students. I was at the same time a public intellectual. In the 1980s I published articles and books that created an impact, was frequently invited to speak in various places, and was invited to go abroad to Europe and the U.S. as a visiting scholar. What I required of myself was: both as a person and in my writing, I had to live with honesty, responsibility and dignity.
Subsequently, because I had returned from the U.S. to take part in the 1989 movement, I was imprisoned for “counter-revolutionary propaganda and incitement to crime,” losing the platform which was my passion; I was never again allowed publish or speak in public in China. Simply for expressing divergent political views and taking part in a peaceful and democratic movement, a teacher loses his podium, a writer loses the right to publish, and a public intellectual loses the chance to speak publicly, which is a sad thing, both for myself as an individual, and for China after three decades of reform and opening up.
Thinking about it, my most dramatic experiences afterJune Fourth have all linked with courts; the two opportunities I had to speak in public have been provided by trials held in the People’s Intermediate Court in Beijing, one in January 1991 and one now. Although the charges on each occasion were different, they were in essence the same, both being crimes of expression.
Twenty years on, the innocent souls of June Fourth do not yet rest in peace, and I, who had been drawn into the path of dissidence by the passions of June Fourth, after leaving the Qincheng Prison in 1991, lost in the right to speak openly in my own country, and could only do so through overseas media, and hence was monitored for many years; placed under surveillance (May 1995 – January 1996); educated through labor (October 1996 – October 1999), and now once again am thrust into the dock by enemies in the regime.
But I still want to tell the regime that deprives me of my freedom, I stand by the belief I expressed twenty years ago in my “June Second Hunger Strike Declaration” — I have no enemies, and no hatred. None of the police who have monitored, arrested and interrogated me, the prosecutors who prosecuted me, or the judges who sentence me, are my enemies. While I’m unable to accept your surveillance, arrest, prosecution or sentencing, I respect your professions and personalities, including Zhang Rongge and Pan Xueqing who act for the prosecution at present. I was aware of your respect and sincerity in your interrogation of me on December 3.
For hatred is corrosive of a person’s wisdom and conscience; the mentality of enmity can poison a nation’s spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles, destroy a society’s tolerance and humanity, and block a nation’s progress to freedom and democracy. I hope therefore to be able to transcend my personal vicissitudes in understanding the development of the state and changes in society, to counter the hostility of the regime with the best of intentions, and defuse hate with love.
As we all know, reform and opening up brought about development of the state and change in society. In my view, it began with abandoning “taking class struggle as the key link,” which had been the ruling principle of the Mao era. We committed ourselves instead to economic development and social harmony. The process of abandoning the “philosophy of struggle” was one of gradually diluting the mentality of enmity, eliminating the psychology of hatred, and pressing out the “wolf’s milk” in which our humanity had been steeped. It was this process that provided a relaxed environment for the reform and opening up at home and abroad, for the restoration of mutual love between people, and soft humane soil for the peaceful coexistence of different values and different interests, and thus provided the explosion of popular creativity and the rehabilitation of warmheartedness with incentives consistent with human nature.
Externally abandoning “anti-imperialism and anti-revisionism,” and internally, abandoning “class struggle” may be called the basic premise of the continuance of China’s reform and opening up to this day. The market orientation of the economy; the cultural trend toward diversity; and the gradual change of order to the rule of law, all benefited from the dilution of this mentality of enmity. Even in the political field, where progress is slowest, dilution of the mentality of enmity also made political power ever more tolerant of diversity in society, the intensity persecution of dissidents has declined substantially, and characterization of the 1989 movement has changed from an “instigated rebellion” to a “political upheaval.”
The dilution of the mentality of enmity made the political power gradually accept the universality of human rights. In 1998, the Chinese government promised the world it would sign the the two international human rights conventions of the U.N., marking China’s recognition of universal human rights standards; in 2004, the National People’s Congress for the first time inscribed into the constitution that “the state respects and safeguards human rights,” signaling that human rights had become one of the fundamental principles of the rule of law. In the meantime, the present regime also proposed “putting people first” and “creating a harmonious society,” which signaled progress in the Party’s concept of rule.
This macro-level progress was discernible as well in my own experiences since being arrested.
While I insist on my innocence, and that the accusations against me are unconstitutional, in the year and more since I lost my freedom, I’ve experienced two places of detention, four pretrial police officers, three prosecutors and two judges. In their handling of the case, there has been no lack of respect, no time overruns and no forced confessions. Their calm and rational attitude has over and again demonstrated goodwill. I was transferred on June 23 from the residential surveillance to Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau Detention Center No. 1, known as “Beikan.” I saw progress in surveillance in the six months I spent there.
I spent time in the old Beikan (Banbuqiao) in 1996, and compared with the Beikan of a decade ago, there has been great improvement in the hardware of facilities and software of management.
In particular, Beikan’s innovative humane management based on respecting the rights and dignity of detainees, implementing more flexible management of the will be flexible to the detainees words and deeds, embodied in the Warm broadcast and Repentance, the music played before meals, and when waking up and going to sleep, gave detainees feelings of dignity and warmth, stimulating their consciousness of keeping order in their cells and opposing the warders sense of themselves as lords of the jail, detainees, providing not only a humanized living environment, but greatly improved the detainees’ environment and mindset for litigation, I had close contact with Liu Zhen, in charge of my cell. People feel warmed by his respect and care for detainees, reflected in the management of every detail, and permeating his every word and deed. Getting to know the sincere, honest, responsible, goodhearted Liu Zhen really was a piece of good luck for me in Beikan.
Political beliefs are based on such convictions and personal experiences; I firmly believe that China’s political progress will never stop, and I’m full of optimistic expectations of freedom coming to China in the future, because no force can block the human desire for freedom. China will eventually become a country of the rule of law in which human rights are supreme. I’m also looking forward to such progress being reflected in the trial of this case, and look forward to the full court’s just verdict — one that can stand the test of history.
Ask me what has been my most fortunate experience of the past two decades, and I’d say it was gaining the selfless love of my wife, Liu Xia. She cannot be present in the courtroom today, but I still want to tell you, sweetheart, that I’m confident that your love for me will be as always. Over the years, in my non-free life, our love has contained bitterness imposed by the external environment, but is boundless in afterthought. I am sentenced to a visible prison while you are waiting in an invisible one. Your love is sunlight that transcends prison walls and bars, stroking every inch of my skin, warming my every cell, letting me maintain my inner calm, magnanimous and bright, so that every minute in prison is full of meaning. But my love for you is full of guilt and regret, sometimes heavy enough hobble my steps. I am a hard stone in the wilderness, putting up with the pummeling of raging storms, and too cold for anyone to dare touch. But my love is hard, sharp, and can penetrate any obstacles. Even if I am crushed into powder, I will embrace you with the ashes.
Given your love, sweetheart, I would face my forthcoming trial calmly, with no regrets about my choice and looking forward to tomorrow optimistically. I look forward to my country being a land of free expression, where all citizens’ speeches are treated the same; here, different values, ideas, beliefs, political views… both compete with each other and coexist peacefully; here, majority and minority opinions will be given equal guarantees, in particular, political views different from those in power will be fully respected and protected; here, all political views will be spread in the sunlight for the people to choose; all citizens will be able to express their political views without fear, and will never be politically persecuted for voicing dissent; I hope to be the last victim of China’s endless literary inquisition, and that after this no one else will ever be jailed for their speech.
Freedom of expression is the basis of human rights, the source of humanity and the mother of truth. To block freedom of speech is to trample on human rights, to strangle humanity and to suppress the truth.
I do not feel guilty for following my constitutional right to freedom of expression, for fulfilling my social responsibility as a Chinese citizen. Even if accused of it, I would have no complaints. Thank you!

The translation was made by David Kelly, an Australian professor of China Studies at the University of Technology Sydney.

blank #55

2010-12-09T00:22:00.004-06:00

Magazine: Blank #55 November 2010
Model: Zen Sevastyanova
Photographer: Paul de Luna

I found this set of photographs to be really beautiful.

From: fakingfashion

Never Let Me Go

2010-12-05T23:28:00.005-06:00

I'm annoyed that I missed this movie in theaters. Not that it would play in any of the monster AMCs near my town. I already love the colors and feel of the trailer. The movie is based off of this book:

The book with the same name, by Kazuo Ishiguro, is one of the best modern works I've read, especially with the way it deal with futuristic/sci-fi-ish topics in a very humanistic, personal, even nostalgic way. The world we see in this book's (and I'm guessing from the trailer, movie's) future is eerily similar looking to the one we live in now. But thats all I'll write...I don't want to give away any spoilers.

Mary HK Choi

2010-11-28T23:19:00.007-06:00

---------------------------

TMN: How can we all be a little more awesome every day?

MHKC: To me, happy is the awesomest flavor of awesome. Hands down. And this speaks to my earlier response, but I honestly think the best thing you can do each and every day to get happy is incrementally work toward creative goals that are heart-burstingly fulfilling. No matter how daunting and unlikely the prospect of success. I mean, I’ve been quasi-skint my whole adult life living in a very expensive city and I’ve launched a TON of things that died or broke and have taken financial risks—but if not now then when? In fact, in the next two years, I’m launching no less than SIX independently published, creator-owned projects with my brother and his fiancée Sonia Oback, who is a super-sick colorist. And those projects will wobble like newborn foal and munch through our savings but, man, it’s so thrilling. I’m not rash and foolhardy enough to buy property or have children, so in the meantime if I can just move forward and leave a trail of creative things that I adored putting together, I think I’ll be happy as much as it’s in my control to be happy. Basically, I think if everyone learned to live like me and followed my teachings they would rule so much harder than if they just went blindly living how they’re inclined to. Oh, and consume other creative’s things. All the time. Gorge. And applaud. And be covetous. And tell them you hate them to their faces. And learn.

From this interview by the Morning News.

I don't know much about Mary HK Choi, except that she recently started writing a column for the NYT that I enjoy a lot. I find her writing fresh, spunky, funny, and often poignant, and that she is a 20- or 30-something Asian doing her own thing in NYC and writing about it is even more inspiring to someone like me.

Thanksgiving

2010-11-25T13:23:00.004-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving! Sometimes it is hard to be happy when you are unsure about so many things. But I need to remind myself that I am very, very, very lucky. And that it is okay to hope and dream, and okay to fail...and that nothing is certain and all things are possible.

Spending my week with my family in Texas for the first time in four years. It is good to be home.

Walden

2010-11-18T13:55:00.004-06:00

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

-Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Miller

2010-11-10T17:28:00.005-06:00

"Why are we so full of restraint? Why do we not give in all directions? Is it fear of losing ourselves? Until we do lose ourselves there is no hope of finding ourselves. We are of the world, and to enter fully into the world we must first lose ourselves in it."

Henry Miller

Somewhere

2010-09-27T12:10:00.003-05:00

I'm interested in Sofia Coppola's new movie, Somewhere, coming out in January. Coppola is a master at creating ambiance in her movies through her gorgeous atmospheric soundtracks. Expect plenty of 80's synth, shoegaze, and fuzziness, a la Air, The Radio Dept., and the Strokes. This trailer is a perfect example. The song playing in the background is the beautiful song, I'll Try Anything Once, by the Strokes.

Ten decisions shape your life,
you'll be aware of 5 about,
7 ways to go through school,
either you're noticed or left out,
7 ways to get ahead,
7 reasons to drop out,
when i said 'I can see me in your eyes',
you said 'I can see you in my bed',
that's not just friendship that's romance too,
you like music we can dance to,

Sit me down,
Shut me up,
i'll calm down,
and i'll get along with you,

There is a time when we all fail,
some people take it pretty well,
some take it all out on themselves,
some they just take it out on friends,
oh everybody plays the game,
and if you don't you're called insane,

Don't don't don't don't it's not safe no more,
i've got to see you one more time,
soon you were born,
in 1984,

Sit me down,
shut me up,
i'll calm down,
and i'll get along with you,

Everybody was well dressed,
and everybody was a mess,
6 things without fail you must do,
so that your woman loves just you,
oh all the girls played mental games,
and all the guys were dressed the same,

Why not try it all,
if you only remember it once,
oooh ooooooh,

Sit me down,
shut me up,
i'll calm down,
and i'll get along with you.

my before sunrise

2010-09-19T21:21:00.007-05:00

I had my very own Before Sunrise kind of night, but with my already-boyfriend, and in the great city of NYC. He dragged me to a concert with Omar Rodriguez Lopez (mind-blowing, by the way) at the Highline Ballroom, and by the time it was all over, we had missed the last train back to New Brunswick and would have to wait until 5:15 for the next train. We proceeded to spend the night wandering about the city, culminating in a night of many adventures:

walking the length of the Highline Park and seeing buildings like trees
downing banh-mi, pho, mango salad, and a sloppy bao in Baoguette on St. Mark's

making cotton candy from a machine on the street
kissing under a weeping willow in an empty park near NYU

jam band at Cafe Wha?
sitting next to the oldest cappuccino machine in the world
reclining in red sofas at the 1846 bar
stepping into a random opened door to listen to a guy singing
walking under oil lamps at Gramarcy park
9/11 tiles on the wire fence

squishing into each other to escape the wind while walking 500 blocks
chocolate muffin at Penn Station (muffin top for me and bottom for him)
passing out at dawn

Hello from Japan

2010-08-09T17:02:00.005-05:00

I am writing this in a hostel in Kyoto at 7 am Japan time and have been up for several hours. Such is jetlag.

Non, Je ne Regrette Rien

2010-08-07T00:04:00.003-05:00

I'm sure everyone is finally familiar with this song because of the movie Inception (a disappointment in my opinion).

This song (and Edith Piaf for that matter) is a stunning triumph in and of itself however. If you get the chance, please watch La Vie en Rose starring Marion Cotillard, a role she won an Oscar Best Actress for. This is the trailer. The movie was incredibly moving, and Piaf was played perfectly by Cotillard, to the point where she transformed and was basically Edith Piaf in my eyes. Also, the story of Piaf's life is terribly tragic and yet, because of her songs, beautiful and triumphant.

translation

No! No regrets
No! I will have no regrets
All the things
That went wrong
For at last I have learned to be strong

No! No regrets
No! I will have no regrets
For the grief doesn't last
It is gone
I've forgotten the past

And the memories I had
I no longer desire
Both the good and the bad
I have flung in a fire
And I feel in my heart
That the seed has been sown
It is something quite new
It's like nothing I've known

No! No regrets
No! I will have no regrets
All the things that went wrong
For at last I have learned to be strong

No! No regrets
No! I will have no regrets
For the seed that is new
It's the love that is growing for you

The Wire

2010-07-25T19:53:00.003-05:00

"We are a culture without the will to seriously examine our own problems. We eschew that which is complex, contradictory or confusing. As a culture, we seek simple solutions. We enjoy being provoked and titillated, but resist the rigorous, painstaking examination of issues that might, in the end, bring us to the point of recognizing our problems, which is the essential first step to solving any of them."

--David Simon of The Wire, from his finale letter

Milkshakes

2010-07-18T10:19:00.005-05:00

Milkshakes

Daydream delusion
Limousine Eyelash
Oh, baby with your pretty face
Drop a tear in my wineglass
Look at those big eyes
See what you mean to me
Sweet cakes and milkshakes
I am a delusion angel
I am a fantasy parade
I want you to know what I think
Don’t want you to
guess anymore
You have no idea where I came from
We have no idea where
we’re going
Launched in life
Like branches in the river
Flowing
downstream
Caught in the current
I’ll carry you. You’ll carry me
That’s how it could be
Don’t you know me?
Don’t you know me by now?

--From Before Sunrise

Before Sunrise and Before Sunset, both by Richard Linklater (who also directed Waking Life), are two beautiful, beautiful movies. They are moments of magic, catches of breath in the rhythm of time.

Celine:

I believe if there's any kind of God it wouldn't be in any of us, not you or me
but just this little space in between. If there's any kind of magic in this
world it must be in the attempt of understanding someone sharing something. I
know, it's almost impossible to succeed but who cares really? The answer must be
in the attempt.

Library Way

2010-07-11T21:50:00.004-05:00

Plaques dot the sidewalk on Library Way in Midtown Manhattan. I love to walk down this street and pause to read them. In a way like the literary version of the Hollywood Walk of Fame, this street is filled with the weighty words and presences of literary greats.
This is also right by my new favorite Japanese lunch/snack quick fix - Cafe Zaiya!

---------------------

I can't believe I am more than halfway through my internship already. Because I work in the MetLife Building, I have the luck of walking through Grand Central Station to and from work everyday. I always make a point to take my time, look up and around, and take in the cavernous main room with windows, painted constellations above, and crowds of people rushing by me. Standing around waiting for a train and taking in the sights of this room was one of my first memories of the city, and its beautiful architecture still manages to astonish me.

Grizzly Bear + Sunset

2010-06-23T21:50:00.002-05:00

Fuzzy pictures from my cell phone. I caught Grizzly Bear over the weekend at the Williamsburg Waterfront in Brooklyn. Listening to their beautifully mushy, organic harmonies and melting guitars, while enjoying an equally beautiful and mushy sunset over the Manhattan skyline, was sublime. Definitely a feeling I won't forget.

New music I am obsessing over lately

2010-06-19T19:41:00.005-05:00

The Radio Dept. - A Token of Gratitude

The Radio Dept.'s 3rd album in 13 years, it's been four years since their last full album Pet Grief. I don't love this album as much as I love Pet Grief, but it's finally some new Radio Dept. so I'm not about to complain. This song is my favorite on the short (only 35 minutes, but then again Pet Grief was 37) album. I heard it for the first time while sitting in the car listening to the radio, as it were, and it felt magical, hearing the dissonant notes reverberate in the darkness. If you've ever watched a movie by Sofia Coppola (The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation, Marie Antoinette), you've listened to The Radio Dept. In fact, I read someone describing Marie Antoinette as a very long The Radio Dept. music video. It's an apt description for anyone that's watched it - lots of beautiful dialogue-less moments, a perfect backdrop to the hazy dream-pop of The Radio Dept.

Gorillaz - On Melancholy Hill

I'm not a huge Gorillaz listener, although I respect them immensely, and I haven't listened to a whole lot of this album. That being said, I LOVE this song. This will probably be my favorite song for a good, long while, until I get sick of listening to it over and over again. It makes me feel sad and extremely happy at the same time, not to mention, the lyrics are wonderful and particularly quote-worthy to a certain loved one. Also, if you can, try to find the music video - it's a great companion.

Up on melancholy hill
There's a plastic tree
Are you here with me
Just looking out on the day
Of another dream

Well you can't get what you want
But you can get me
So let's set up and see
'Cause you are my medicine
When you're close to me
When you're close to me

So call in the submarine
'Round the world will go
Does anybody know
If we're looking out on the day
Of another dream

If you can't get what you want
Then you come with me

Up on melancholy hill
A manatee?
Just looking out on the day
When you're close to me
When you're close to me

When you're close to me

I Need Air

2010-05-22T23:26:00.007-05:00

I Need Air

 I could see it wasn't worth
Spending time with them on earth.
There were fewer in the sky.
I decided I would fly.
I need air...

Where only stars get in my hair:
And only eagles stop and stare.
I need air.

Oh, the work is mad
And I've had my share.
I need air.
I need air.
I need air...

There's not a sign of life down there.
Just hats and grown-ups everywhere.
I need air.


Lots of cosy sky
That God and I can share.
I need air.
I need air.

-- Alan Lerner

From the musical 'The Little Prince', based on the book by Antoine St. Exupery (the pilot sings this)

The Edge

2010-05-22T11:49:00.002-05:00

“The Edge... there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over.”

- Hunter S. Thompson

Lit (or: to the scientist I am not speaking to any more)

2010-05-19T20:25:00.004-05:00

Lit (or: to the scientist I am not speaking to any more)

Don’t say you didn’t see this coming, Jason.

Don’t say you didn’t realize this would be my reaction
and that you never intended for me to get all worked up,
because if that were true, then you are dumber
than Lenny from Mice and Men, blinder than Oedipus
and Tierus put together and can feel less
than a Dalton Trumbo character.

You put the Dick in Dickens and the Boo in kowski
and are more Coward-ly then Noël.

But you don’t understand any of these references,
Do you, Jason? Because you ‘don’t read’.
You are a geology major and you once told me
That, ‘Scientists don’t read popular literature,
Cristin, we have more important things to do’.

Well, f--- you.

Be glad you don’t read, Jason,
because maybe you won’t understand this
as I scream it to you on your front lawn,
on Christmas Day, brandishing three hypodermic needles,
a ginsu knife and a letter of permission
from Bret Easton Ellis.

Jason, you are more absurd than Ionesco.
You are more abstract than Joyce,
more inconsistent than Agatha Christie
and more Satanic than Rushdie’s verses.

I can’t believe I used to want to Sappho you, Jason.
I used to want to Pablo Neruda you,
to Anais Nin And Henry Miller you. I used to want
to be O for you, to blow for you in ways
that even Odysseus’ sails couldn’t handle.
But self-imposed illiteracy isn’t a turn-on.

You used to make fun of me being a writer,
saying ‘Scientists cure diseases,
what do writers do?’

But of course, you wouldn’t understand, Jason.
I mean, have you ever gotten an inner thirsting
for Zora Neale Hurston?
Or heard angels herald for you
to read F Scott Fitzgerald?
Have you ever had a beat attack for Jack Kerouac?
The only Morrison you know is Jim, and you think
you’re the noble one?

Go Plath yourself.

Your heart is so dark, that even Joseph Conrad
couldn’t see it, and it is so buried under bullshit
that even Poe’s cops couldn’t hear it.

Your mind is as empty as the libraries in Fahrenheit 451.
Your mind is as empty as Silas Marner’s coffers.
Your mind is as empty as Huckleberry Finn’s wallet.

And some people might say that this poem
is just a pretentious exercise
in seeing how many literary references
I can come up with.

And some people might complain that this poem is,
at its core, shallow, expressing the same emotion again,
and again, and again. (I mean, there are only so many times
you can articulate your contempt for Jason,
before people get bored.)

But you know what, Jason? Those people would be wrong.

Because this is not the poem I am writing to express
my hatred for you.

This poem is the poem I am writing because we aren’t speaking,
and it is making my heart hurt so bad, it is all I
can do just to get up off the floor sometimes.

And this is the poem I am writing instead of writing
the ‘I miss having breakfast with you’ poem, instead of
writing the ‘Let’s walk dogs in our old schoolyard
again’ poem.

Instead of the ‘How are you doing?’ poem, the ‘I miss you’ poem,
the ‘I wish I was making fun of how much you like Garth
Brooks while sitting in front of your parents’ house
in your jeep’ poem, instead of the ‘Holidays are coming around
and you know what that means: SUICIDE!’ poem.

I am writing this so that I can stop wanting to write
the ‘I could fall in love with you again so quickly
if only you would say one more word to me’ poem.

But I am tired of loving you, Jason
cause you don’t love me right.

And if some pretentious-ass poem can stop me
From thinking about the way your laugh sounds,
about the way your skin feels in the rain,
about how I would rather be miserable with you,
then happy with anyone else in the world.

If some pretentious-ass poem can do all that?
Then I am gone with the wind, I am on the road,
I have flown over the f---ing cuckoo’s nest,
I am gone, I am gone, I am gone.

I am.

-- Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz

her website

Cristin performing this poem live at Page Meets Stage.

---------------

Literary geeks out there like me will probably appreciate and laugh at the many references this poem makes (I can recall about half). I like this poem because it is funny, angry and also sad. I don't like how it continues to reinforce the idea that love and appreciation for fields like science and literature cannot coexist in the same mind. We are trained to think that people are either left- or right-brained, that physicists don't read poetry* and mathematicians are unemotional, that an artsy person can't be a mathematical person as well. This is why I love that there are people like Rebecca Elson, topics like modular origami, and books like Einstein's Dreams (I've mentioned all of these previously on the blog) out there to meld the two "opposites" and prove they are complementary.

*a very funny example
Patton Oswald - Physics for Poets

--------------------------

Currently reading: Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
So far, shallowly, I dislike Clarissa and would absolutely marry Peter Walsh.

The Word by Tony Hoagland

2010-05-11T14:22:00.004-05:00

The Word

Down near the bottom
of the crossed-out list
of things you have to do today,

between "green thread"
and "broccoli" you find
that you have penciled "sunlight."

Resting on the page, the word
is as beautiful, it touches you
as if you had a friend

and sunlight were a present
he had sent you from some place distant
as this morning -- to cheer you up,

and to remind you that,
among your duties, pleasure
is a thing,

that also needs accomplishing
Do you remember?
that time and light are kinds

of love, and love
is no less practical
than a coffee grinder

or a safe spare tire?
Tomorrow you may be utterly
without a clue

but today you get a telegram,
from the heart in exile
proclaiming that the kingdom

still exists,
the king and queen alive,
still speaking to their children,

- to any one among them
who can find the time,
to sit out in the sun and listen.

-- Tony Hoagland

His website

---------------------------

A beautiful reminder that I stumbled across while slaving away at finals.

Fable Attraction

2010-05-08T15:45:00.006-05:00

One of my favorite editorials is by Carter Smith, featuring Natalia Vodianova, called "Fable Attraction." It appeared in W Magazine May 2002. I love the whimsy and fairy-tale-like touches everywhere. Reminds me of Where the Wild Things Are plus maybe Peter Pan!

photos from TFS

Atoms for Peace

2010-04-29T13:40:00.007-05:00

I was lucky to catch Thom Yorke and his just-formed group Atoms for Peace a few weeks ago at the Roseland Ballroom in NYC in the first concert of their tour. Needless to say, it was incredibly awesome (minus the crowd which didn't seem all that up for dancing)! I don't know much about musical big-names but apparently the other members of his group are Red Hot Chili Pepper's bassist (who was so crazy energetic the whole time and had blue hair...and his name is Flea?) and the drummer normally performs with Beck (I think...). Not to mention, apparently Michael Stipe, lead singer for R.E.M. was in the audience (there was a lot of finger pointing during the concert at the balcony where he was sitting)!

And of course, Thom Yorke is the lead singer for Radiohead. He did release a solo album a few years back called The Eraser, which were the songs Atoms for Peace played this night. They also unveiled some surprises, including a new collaborative song from Atoms for Peace, and two songs by Thom Yorke that are in the works, one of them never played before in front of anyone! I like it a lot already...I would love to hear Radiohead take it on.

Here's the video from that very night (gotta love Youtube!):

The song this impromptu band is named after is on this album, and is one of my favorites. The title comes from a speech given by President Eisenhower about using atomic energy peacefully and to bring about good. Up until then, atomic energy had been used in the killing of millions, and bringing about arms wars involving weapons of mass destruction and fears of destroying the entire Earth in another world war.

Thom Yorke in an interview said that this song is actually about the doubts he had as a musician about going out and making a solo album when he had never worked alone before. The allies are the people that believed in him and encouraged him to overcome self-doubt.

Here is a remix of that song (remixed by Four Tet!)

Thom Yorke - Atoms For Peace (Four Tet remix)

No more going to the dark side
With your flying saucer eyes
No more falling down a wormhole
That I have to pull you out

The wriggling, twiggling worm inside
Devours from the inside out
No more talk about the old days
It's time for something great

Want you to get out
And make it work

So many allies, so many allies
So many allies, so many allies
So feel the love come off of them
And take me in your arms

Peel all of your layers off
I want to eat your artichoke heart
No more leaky holes in your brain
And no false starts

I wanna get out
And make it work

So many allies, so many allies
So many allies, so many allies
So feel the love come off of them
And take me in your arms

I wanna get out
And make it work

Want you to get out
And make it work

I'll be ok

waking life pt 2

2010-04-25T19:53:00.003-05:00

I re-watched Waking Life on an airplane from Chicago to New Jersey the other day. I find this movie to be incredibly inspiring and thought-provoking, every time I watch it.

------------------------

"On this bridge," Lorca warns, "life is not a dream. Beware. And beware. And beware."

And so many think because Then happened, Now isn't. But didn't I mention the ongoing "wow" is happening right now? We are all co-authors of this dancing exuberance where even our inabilities are having a roast.

We are the authors of ourselves, co-authoring a gigantic Dostoevsky novel, starring clowns.

This entire thing we're involved with called the world, is an opportunity to exhibit how exciting alienation can be. Life is a matter of a miracle that is collected over time by moments, flabbergasted to be in each other's presence. The world is an exam to see if we can rise into direct experience. Our eyesight is here as a test to see if we can see beyond it. Matter is here as a test for our curiosity. Doubt is here as an exam for our vitality.

Thomas Mann wrote that he would rather participate in life than write 100 stories.

Giacometti was once run down by a car, and he recalled falling into a lucid faint, a sudden exhilaration, as he realized that at last something was happening to him.

An assumption develops that you cannot understand life and live life simultaneously. I do not agree entirely. Which is to say I do not exactly disagree. I would say that life understood is life lived. But the paradoxes bug me, and I can learn to love and make love to the paradoxes that bug me. And on really romantic evenings of self, I go salsa dancing with my confusion.

Before you drift off, don't forget. Which is to say, remember. Because remembering is so much more a psychotic activity than forgetting.

Lorca, in that same poem said that the iguana will bite those who do not dream. And as one realizes that one is a dream figure in another person's dream, that is self awareness.

Timothy "Speed" Levitch

-----

City That Does Not Sleep - Federico García Lorca

"In 1992 he received his tour guide license from the Central Park Conservancy. He later took a position with Apple and Gray Line Tours as a tour bus guide. He soon attracted a cult following, due not only to his fast talking style, but also for his obvious love of his native city and passionate philosophical ideas." -bio

---------

As for exciting news related to my life, I'm finally 21. I am also going to Japan this summer!

Aberration - Rebecca Elson

2010-04-10T22:47:00.003-05:00

Aberration
(The Hubble Space Telescope before repair)

The way they tell it
All the stars have wings
The sky so full of wings
There is no sky
And just for a moment
You forget
The error and the crimped
Paths of light
And you see it
The immense migration
And you hear the rush
The beating

by Rebecca Elson - astronomer and writer

repost

2010-04-08T10:29:00.005-05:00

Hey.

You a dreamer?

Yeah.

Haven't seen too many around lately. Things have been tough lately for dreamers. They say dreaming's dead, that no one does it anymore. It's not dead, it's just been forgotten. Removed from our language. No one teaches it so no one knows it exists. The dreamer is banished to obscurity. Well I'm trying to change all that, and I hope you are too. By dreaming every day. Dreaming with our hands and dreaming with our minds. Our planet is facing the greatest problems it's ever faced. Ever. So whatever you do, don't be bored. This is absolutely the most exciting time we could have possibly hoped to be alive. And things are just starting.

excerpt from Waking Life

Irony of Blogging

2010-03-09T22:17:00.005-06:00

Writing

A man who keeps a diary, pays
Due toll to many tedious days;
But life becomes eventful--then
His busy hand forgets the pen.
Most books, indeed, are records less
Of fulness than of emptiness.

-- William Allingham

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Every time I go through a really busy period in my life, I feel like this is the busiest I have ever been, ever. And then looking back, it doesn't feel like it was so bad anymore. Which is why I am just hoping to get through this week...one day at a time.
Soon it will become only a faintly onerous speck of time in the past, when I'm lying on the beach and catching up on sleep in Florida next week. If only! Thanks to my professors, I'll be the only person in Miami, sitting in a hotel room every night all week, trying (and probably failing) to edit the Linux kernel or write a BitTorrent client.

The Archipelago of Kisses - Jeffrey McDaniel

2010-03-03T19:24:00.004-06:00

The Archipelago of Kisses
Jeffrey McDaniel

We live in a modern society. Husbands and wives don't
grow on trees, like in the old days. So where
does one find love? When you're sixteen it's easy,
like being unleashed with a credit card
in a department store of kisses. There's the first kiss.
The sloppy kiss. The peck.
The sympathy kiss. The backseat smooch. The we
shouldn't be doing this kiss. The but your lips
taste so good kiss. The bury me in an avalanche of tingles kiss.
The I wish you'd quit smoking kiss.
The I accept your apology, but you make me really mad
sometimes kiss. The I know
your tongue like the back of my hand kiss. As you get
older, kisses become scarce. You'll be driving
home and see a damaged kiss on the side of the road,
with its purple thumb out. If you
were younger, you'd pull over, slide open the mouth's
red door just to see how it fits. Oh where
does one find love? If you rub two glances, you get a smile.
Rub two smiles, you get a warm feeling.
Rub two warm feelings and presto-you have a kiss.
Now what? Don't invite the kiss over
and answer the door in your underwear. It'll get suspicious
and stare at your toes. Don't water the kiss with whisky. It'll turn bright pink and explode into a thousand luscious splinters,
but in the morning it'll be ashamed and sneak out of
your body without saying good-bye,
and you'll remember that kiss forever by all the little cuts it left
on the inside of your mouth. You must
nurture the kiss. Turn out the lights. Notice how it
illuminates the room. Hold it to your chest
and wonder if the sand inside hourglasses comes from a
special beach. Place it on the tongue's pillow,
then look up the first recorded kiss in an encyclopedia: beneath
a Babylonian olive tree in 1200 B.C.
But one kiss levitates above all the others. The
intersection of function and desire. The I do kiss.
The I'll love you through a brick wall kiss.
Even when I'm dead, I'll swim through the Earth,
like a mermaid of the soil, just to be next to your bones.

Rediscovered this poem today. I think Jeffrey McDaniel really is my favorite poet.

We Plants Are Happy People - Apollo

2010-02-24T17:11:00.012-06:00

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--Living 14,000 years didn't make me a genius.
I just had time.
Time.
We can't see it, we can't hear it, We can't weigh it, we can't measure it in a laboratory. It's a subjective sense of becoming what we are instead of what we were a nanosecond ago, becoming what we will be in another nanosecond.
The hopis see time as a landscape, existing before and behind us. And we move-- We move through it, slice by slice.
--Clocks measure time.
--No, they measure themselves. The objective reference of a clock is another clock.
--How very interesting. What has it got to do with John?
--Oh, he--He might be a man who lives outside of time as we know it."

-----------------------

The Man From Earth (2007)

"What if a man from the Upper Paleolithic had survived until the present day?"

I haven't seen this movie, but now I want to, maybe. It is a science fiction musing-in-a-movie from 2007 about a very, very old man. Discovered through a song.

---------------------

An EPIC song:

We Plants Are Happy Plants - Apollo

Les Misérables

2010-02-24T00:45:00.003-06:00

I am re-posting this excerpt from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo, because it is good to be reminded of things sometimes:

"We may say, by the way, that success is a hideous thing. Its counterfeit of merit deceives men. To the mass, success has almost the same appearances as supremacy. Success, that pretender to talent, has a dupe, - history. Juvenal and Tacitus only reject it. In our days, a philosophy which is almost an official has entered into its service, wears its livery, and waits in its antechamber. Success; that is the theory. Prosperity supposes capacity. Win in the lottery, and you are an able man. The victor is venerated. To be born with a caul is everything. Have but luck, and you will have the rest, be fortunate, and you will be thought great. Beyond the five or six great exceptions, which are the wonder of their age, contemporary admiration to nothing but shortsightedness. Gilt is gold. To be a chance comer is no drawback, provided you have improved your chances. The common herd is an old Narcissus, who adores himself, and who applauds the common. That mighty genius, by which one becomes a Moses, an Aeschylus, a Dante, a Michael Angelo, or a Napolean, the multitude assigns at once and by acclamation to whoever succeeds in his object, whatever it may be. Let a notary rise to be a deputy; let a sham Corneille write Tiridate; let a eunuch come into the possession of a harem; let a military Prudhomme accidentally win the decisive battle of an epoch, let an apothecary invent pasteboard soles for army shoes, and lay up, by selling this pasteboard instead of leather for the army of the Sambre-et-Meuse, four hundred thousand livres in the funds; let a pack-pedlar espouse usury and bring her to bed of seven or eight millions, of which he is the father and she the mother; let a preacher become a bishop by talking through his nose; let the steward of a good house become so rich on leaving service that he is made Minister of Finance; - men call that Genius, just as they call the face of Mousqueton, Beauty, and the hearing of Claude, Majesty. They confound the the radiance of the stars of heaven with the radiations which a duck's foot leaves in the mud."

SUCCESS IS NOT AN INDICATOR OF TALENT

summer lookin

2010-02-19T22:07:00.011-06:00

I love the way these people look....would love to incorporate some colors, proportions, fit, pieces into my rather girlish wardrobe. I always find myself, especially lately, inspired by what guys are wearing. Especially pants, both slim and slouchy ones, some thick belts, blazers, and sweaters. Also looking for more pastels (sea green, light pinks and creams, baby blues), silvers, and light browns.

Again, I love faded colors, and the wash on the jeans are great.

Actually not a fan of the accessories (except the belt), but especially love the loose fit of the pants and fitted blazer.

I like very much the way this looks...but I can't ever get up the courage to dress like this because I get the feeling that I'll look too stuffy/old/ugly.

---------------------------------------------

I've just finished weeks of intense interviewing and am so excited about landing a DREAM internship in NYC this summer! However, this has caused me to be thinking a lot about clothes...specifically work clothes. My interviews made me painfully aware of how little work-appropriate clothes I actually own. In fact, just about everything I own is casual wear! I have been spending money all my life on little summer dresses and tanks, jeans, cotton tops, mini skirts and shorts, and just about everything I could absolutely NOT wear on the job. Naturally I am super excited to go work clothes shopping! Specifically I have been thinking of...pants with a slouchy men's cut, girly and frilly white and cream silk blouses, long blazers that hit past the hip, a-line high-waisted skirts, solid utilitarian belts, colorful little scarves, and crisp button-ups in pastel colors. I also want more small stud earrings and thicker statement necklaces. Oh yes, and oxfords and pumps. So much to think about!

-------------------------------------------

When I think of working in NYC, I am reminded of the outfits worn in Annie Hall and its modern sister, When Harry Met Sally by the main female characters. This is how I imagine I'd like to dress - adjectives that come to mind are comfortable, loose, frumpy, nostalgic, natural, masculine, but of course I would inject some of my own splashes of frothy girlishness, and try to look a little less frumpy (especially considering some of Sally's outfits!) As an aside, both these movies are in my favorites and I definitely would recommend them. Not to mention they probably contributed to the romanticized vision of NYC I have in my head!

Photos from the Sartorialist, FaceHunter, and Jak & Jil.

Alexander McQueen

2010-02-11T22:47:00.011-06:00

A video heavy tribute to Lee McQueen - a true artist, visionary, and provocateur. His works have always stood out as creations of rare beauty, craftsmanship, and innovation. He was never afraid to be different, shocking, or delve into the macabre or grotesque. Watching a one of his collections unfold was often like reaching into the human psyche - sometimes a weird and twisted place, but always beautiful. Still can't believe he is gone...

His show finales were always a spectacle. In this show, a hologram image of Kate Moss swirling about in his dress is suspended in a glass prism - to the tune of Schindler's List.

My favorite of his collections - beautiful, romantic, and magical images of royalty.

Another finale - a model in a white dress gets paint sprayed on her by two robot arms.

Dalai Lama

2010-02-05T17:25:00.003-06:00

"Everyday, think as you wake up: Today I am fortunate to have woken up. I am alive. I have a precious human life. I am not going to waste it. I am going to use all my energies to develop myself to expand my heart out to others for the benefit of all beings."

Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet

Andrew Wyeth

2010-01-17T23:29:00.012-06:00

Two days ago was the first anniversary of Andrew Wyeth's death at 91 years old. He had a long and storied career as a famous and celebrated artist known for painting portraits of people with subtle emotions and romantic rural landscapes in watercolor and egg tempura.

I first found out about Andrew Wyeth when I came across a print of one of his paintings in a huge box of prints at a street fair in New York City a few months ago. While rifling through the many $1 prints of other famous paintings, this one stood out to me. The name "Chambered Nautilus" refers to the nautilus, a sea animal that calls its shell home. It is well known for its shell's spiral, which follows a logarithmic pattern.

The nautilus shell in the painting mirrors the girl in her bed, surrounded by sheets and curtains, looking out the window. I have this print sitting in my room now because it reminds me of myself and my room, and the cozy feeling I get sitting on my bed, with all the things I love and the memories they carry around me. This painting gives me that feeling of peace, comfort, and home when I look at it.

I've posted some more of his paintings that I also really like. What I love about his paintings are the beautiful, subdued colors that are yet incredibly detailed in their portrayal of light, emotion, and texture. Not a wrinkle, blade of grass, or ripple of water is missed or out of place. His paintings all evoke a mood of calm and peace in me that I very much enjoy. Kind of like the calm one gets while walking in the rain, being surrounded by nature, or feeling the morning sun while slowly waking up.

Most of his portraits of people are of his many neighbors at his farm in Maine, where he lived for much of his life. This one, his most famous, is called "Christina's World," depicting his neighbor Christina who he found crawling across a field, because she an illness that paralyzed her from the waist down but refused to use a wheelchair.

Wilde

2010-01-10T17:00:00.003-06:00

A man's face is his autobiography. A woman's face is her work of fiction.

- Oscar Wilde

Intellectual Property

2010-01-03T18:08:00.007-06:00

RiP: A Remix Manifesto from Laurent LaSalle on Vimeo.

Watch this documentary if you've got the time - good, visual discussion on intellectual property and the problems this idea is creating in the lives of mixers, remixers, and just about anybody that likes to take old ideas and make them new. It talks a lot about Girl Talk, a guy that makes a living out of mashing up other people's music. I saw Girl Talk's show at Bonnaroo in the wee hours of the morning and quite honestly had the time of my life - that night is one of my favorite memories from 2009.

Intellectual property basically is a term for legal monopolies over creations of the mind - that is, an owner may claim exclusive rights to a number of "intangible assets," such as a story, song, phrase, invention, symbol, or design that he or she has come up with and has now patented, copyrighted, or trademarked.

Economically, this was originally intended to encourage inventors and creators out there to keep inventing and creating, and in return help our society grow and innovate. Otherwise, if they had a great idea, other people would just copy it and they would get no reward for coming up with something new. This way, people are encouraged to innovate, and as a result, just about everybody benefits from the new ideas created.

However, the idea of owning the rights to one's own ideas has gone a little too far, in my opinion. People (or shall I say corporations?) are now patenting plants they have created or discovered and DNA sequences they have found, even trademarking certain colors. Where it is really going overboard is the amount of time these monopolies can last. Copyrights can extend for hundreds of years - and now, by the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, can be renewed without restriction. Patents for most inventions tend to be at least twenty years. For pharmaceutical companies, this means keeping low-cost over-the-counter alternatives out of stores while they sell their expensive medications. That, in turn, means many poor people will unnecessarily suffer, when there is treatment out there that could be made affordable to them.

What the documentary focuses on, however, is media, such as music, stories, and movies. I think a big problem with copyrighting these sorts of ideas is that they can be broken down into small parts that are not necessarily copyrighted. For instance, a book is made up of many words and short phrases. If you used a word in a book, you aren't breaking the copywrite because certainly that word has been used by plenty of other people. Ditto with a note or beat in a song. At some point though, you will be taking "too much." But where is this point? At what point does an idea become completely one's own or original to the point where someone else couldn't have put those notes or words together on their own by their own train of thought or by happenstance?

What about taking bits and pieces of different things and putting them together to make something new, such as is the case with Girl Talk? His songs break all kinds of copyright laws - but isn't what he does kind of what we all do when we make something new in our minds? Every new idea out there builds on the ideas of the people that came before it. That's how we have gotten where we are today, by collaboration and putting our heads together.

Thomas Jefferson was also against copyrights and patents of intellectual property. He brings to point how ideas and inspiration are infectious, making it impossible for one to create something without drawing upon the influences of others, perhaps without even realizing that someone else's idea helped form one's own. Also, ideas are non-rival goods - they can be used any number of times by any number of people simultaneously without affecting their quality or other's ability to use it as well.

Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property.
—Thomas Jefferson, to Isaac McPherson 13 Aug. 1813 Writings 13:333--35[14]

I do think intellectual property is a good thing and has led to a lot of the progress we have seen in society today. However, the duration of patents, copyrights, and etc. have become too long. Intellectual property permits a monopoly - yes, it is good for innovation in the short run so inventors may reap their rewards, but in the long run will impede progress because it limits competition. Not to mention, if the invention is potentially life-saving, it is wrong to bar it from those that cannot afford the inflated prices for such a long time. Also, the system becomes compromised when companies do nothing but go around buying up patents and making money off of the legal rights and suing of other groups/people but doing little creating/innovating of their own. Sounds a little like a big record company, no?

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Lewis Hyde, who I mentioned below, has for more than ten years been a proponent of a "cultural commons" and is working on a book about this topic. The same Times article I mentioned below touches on some of his thoughts.

Irony

2010-01-02T22:33:00.007-06:00

"Irony has only emergency use. Carried over time, it is the voice of the trapped who have come to enjoy their cage."

- Lewis Hyde

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Lewis Hyde is the author of the well-known book The Gift and many other essays, poems, and other works, which have garnered him many awards, including a MacArthur "genius grant" back in 1991. I have yet to read The Gift but after reading a little about it, I definitely hope to get to it soon. Suffice to say it is a book about the creation and validation of art, and how it can be seen in "gift economics" as a commodity that gains value by exchanging hands. There is a well-written article about him in the Times.

new years

2010-01-01T10:34:00.005-06:00

Happy New Years!

I have many aspirations for and hopes pinned on 2010 - here's to getting a step closer to my dreams in the coming year!

Also, happy new decade. Wow, I can't even begin to wrap my head around what it would be like to be thirty at the end of this decade!

New Orleans

2009-12-29T22:55:00.004-06:00

I spent the weekend in New Orleans, which really was a lot of fun. It really is a laid-back, vibrant, and very colorful community. Each house we drove by seemed to have a quirky character of its own (and not just in the French Quarter). Though most of the area by the river is lovely to look at and bustling with business, it is distressing to see the scar of Katrina still lingering here and there in the city, and much more so outside the immediate downtown. I saw lots and lots of boarded up business and restaurants, as well as fallen-down or decrepit houses with holes in the roof, boards over windows and doors, grafitti, and moss growing everywhere. It was only after a second glance that I was shocked to realize that a few of these houses were actually still being lived in. It only makes me want to come back to New Orleans again and try to give back a little more - next time, when I am over 21 and perhaps around Mardi Gras, for some random revelries!

More pictures on my flickr.

30 Favorite Songs of All Time

2009-12-25T15:47:00.026-06:00

Merry Christmas!

I'm sitting here on my cozy bed, surrounded by thicket warm blankets, with the smell of just-baked muffins in the air, warm sun drifting through the windows, just-made snowman slowly melting on a Christmas morning (in Texas, of all places! My first white Christmas in the middle of Texas??) ...Yes, that's right, I'm finally home! It's a perfect lazy day to sit around, eat, and play my favorite music.

And, so, I decided to pick out my 30 favorite songs of all time. Why? Yes, I'm a little bored...plus lists are fun to make. Also, the decade is nearing to a close, and since I've only been alive two decades and the first one wasn't very musically productive, I figured now would be a good time to mark my (less-than) decade-long immersion in music. 30, because I couldn't really think of any more definitive "yes's" after about 30, and I really tried to pick songs that have a special place in my heart or memories, not just a beat I liked or a catchy, clever lyric. Not that none of these songs have great beats or catchy lyrics or anything! I didn't rank them in order because it was kind of heart-wrenching to try and rank these songs...it felt wrong, like ranking one's children or something.

I think in the future that I will look back upon the 2000's fondly, as the time where I grew up and became me. Who knows though, maybe "me" will become something entirely else in the future - though I hope that that's not the case!

Mind you, there's going to be a lot of gushing, overflowing love and adoration in the rest of this entry - feel free to ignore the drooling...

1. Elliot Smith - Angeles

Either/Or

I don't know a whole lot about Elliot Smith's other music, but this song means a lot to me. I am even trying to learn how to fingerpick this on guitar. I can do it, but not very well and not very fast...in other words, I can't even begin to touch the gentle, effortless magic of his fingers gliding over the strings. R.I.P. Elliot Smith...you died before I got to know anything about you.

2. Ola Podrida - Instead
Ola Podrida

I have a thing for intricate fingerpicking on guitars, and this song gets me every time...so delicately and achingly beautiful.

3. Iron & Wine - Naked as We Came

Our Endless Numbered Days

I first started listening to Iron & Wine in, I want to say 11th grade, almost 5 years ago. Naked as We Came was the first song I ever heard by them and at the time, it was the most beautiful song I'd ever heard in my life. One of us will die inside these arms - it is about living and dying with the person you love. P.S. love to play this on guitar while singing.

4. Friendly Fires - Paris ft. Au Revoir Simone, remix by Aeroplane

original song from CD - Friendly Fires

I am not a huge fan of Friendly Fires' stuff and I don't really like the original song as much as I like this remix, especially with Au Revoir Simone's voice. Everything comes together perfectly in this song - longing, love, euphoria, a hint of desperation.

5. Telepopmusik - Breathe

Genetic World

Only heard this song a couple months ago for the first time and I am absolutely hooked on it. Perfect song to listen to while waking up, driving, flying, making mundane tasks seem fresh.

6. Neutral Milk Hotel - In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

In The Aeroplane Over the Sea

I love everything in this song - his voice, the saw, the trumpets, but most of all I love the story he tells. I think they are the most beautiful (there's that word again!) lyrics of any song I know.

7. The Radio Dept. - Sleeping In

Pet Grief

I first heard of The Radio Dept. through the Marie Antoinette soundtrack and quickly fell in love with Pet Grief. This is a CD I can put on loop and feel great about it hours later. "Sleeping In" is what I'd love to do while listening to The Radio Dept. Dreamy, half-baked, wistful music.

8. Voxtrot - The Start of Something

Voxtrot

This is a song that gives me feelings of nostalgia when I hear it for some reason - I don't really associate it with any particular memory. It is poppy and catchy and very, very dreamy.

9. Aphex Twin - Avril 14th

Drukqs

Close race between this and Film for my favorite Aphex Twin song. This wins just because it's the day after my birthday. I can't really listen or get into a lot of his work, but at the same time there are a few songs that get it just right, like this one. I even learned to play this on piano but then promptly forgot it a year later.

10. School of Seven Bells - Half Asleep

Alpinisms

Wow, one of my favorite song to play, listen, and sing along to for the past year and a half. The lyrics are a long run-on, a stream-of-consciousness story of a sleeping wakeness, a fleeting memory, a longing feeling - wonderful!

11. The Knife - Heartbeats

Deep Cuts

They say imitation is the greatest form of flattery...no doubt my list proves it. I love the Jose Gonzalez version, and have it down on guitar, but I absolutely love The Knife's original because it is done in a way no one but The Knife could convey -mostly because of Karin Dreijer Andersson's unique voice.

12. Gordon Downie - Insomniacs of the World, Goodnight
Coke Machine Glow

I cry when I listen to this song. It is about loneliness, longing, insomnia. I don't know exactly why it makes me emotional but this song is very special to me.

13. Belle & Sebastian - Is it Wicked Not to Care?

The Boy With the Arab Strap

One of my favorite bands ever since I was in junior high. Isobel Campbell's wispy voice was always to me an intrinsic part of Belle & Sebastian's melancholy beautiful sound...it was so sad to see her go.

14. Blonde Redhead - 23

23

So addicting...I love Kazu Makino's voice and love to sing to this song.

15. Eletrelane - To the East

No Shouts No Calls

This song extrapolated perfectly into my situation when I first heard it over winter break two years ago. I was back from school on the east coast, not sure if I felt at home there, missing someone far away, and desperately wanting to make it all work.

16. Explosions in the Sky - Your Hand in Mine (with strings)

The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place

So beautiful. I also love this entire album.

17. Grizzly Bear - Easier

Yellow House

Erf, Grizzly Bear, what can I say about you? They are amazing to hear live...I got to see them up close and personal at Bonnaroo and it was mind-blowing. It's really hard to pick a favorite from their songs. Honestly, their voices are so lovely seperately, it's like a heart attack of the ears (in a great, overwhelming way) when they start doing that harmonizing thing.

18. LCD Soundsystem - Someone Great

Sound of Silver

Very sad song - he describes the feelings and thoughts perfectly like I understand just what he means, but he dresses it up in a synth and beats, which somehow seem to make it all the sadder and more poignant.

19. Liars - The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack

The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack

This song is such perfection - something I would say, play, or sing to someone I love deeply.

20. Massive Attack - Teardrop

Mezzanine

My very first boyfriend (if you call it that back in the day!) sent me this song when I was 12 (he was 13). I don't know if he was listening to a lot of Massive Attack or trip-hop in those days or what, but I didn't get it until much later. Probably I was just too immature...anyway, I understand why now!

21. The National - Fake Empire

Boxer

This song is an exquisite little gem. Lots of tip-toeing and hush-hushing so as to not disturb the dream.

22. The Beatles - Here, There, and Everywhere

Revolver

Favorite Beatles song...I know it may be an odd choice out of all their music (and I don't really like Paul McCartney that much) but it just rings so true to me.

23. Nick Drake - Place to Be

Pink Moon

What can I say...beautiful love ballad from a true master.

24. Radiohead - Videotape

In Rainbows

Achingly sad, even painfully so. Thom Yorke's voice gives shivers. You are my center when I spin away... This CD (plus CD 2) were my introduction to Radiohead, and it is still my favorite after listening to the rest.

25. Joanna Newsom - Peach, Plum, Pear

The Milk-Eyed Mender

Her voice is as unique as it gets, and her harp playing is magnificent. I love this song for its rawness.

26. Regina Spektor - Us

Soviet Kitsch

I love to belt out this song - the story is tongue-in-cheek and wonderful, not to mention I'm such a sucker for strings and love songs. Add Regina Spektor's strong but light-hearted singing and it's a keeper!

27. Sigur Ros - Hoppipolla

Takk

Used to be my favorite song EVER. Not so much anymore, but it's definitely up there. This song makes me so incredibly happy and euphoric. The music video is so endearing, as they all are by Sigur Ros. I was given this CD by a good friend...it is still one of my favorites, though I can't manage to listen to it for very long or often (it really takes it out of me).

28. The Strokes - What Ever Happened

Room on Fire

I have a memory of listening to this song in a car, my head out the window, sunlight flickering through the trees, wind blowing, being very happy and in love.

29. Animal Collective - The Purple Bottle

Feels

Another very special song to me. Can I tell you that you are the purple in me? What says it better than that? Though they didn't play this song, when I think of Bonnaroo, I think of Animal Collective's set - dancing around in the hot sun in the middle of a field in Tennessee, getting sweaty and thirsty, listening to music about being at an outdoor music festival.

30. Andrew Bird - Yawny at the Apocalypse

Armchair Apocrypha

Last, but no way in heck least. I know Andrew Bird doesn't sing on this track, but in a way it is much better. When I hear this, I can see him literally morphing into his namesake, flying over our heads, and singing this scratchy, forlorn, lilting melody, conveying emotions words could never.

Peng! 33

2009-12-17T17:08:00.008-06:00

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Iron & Wine - Peng! 33 (Stereolab cover)

Curiosity far greater than the fear

It felt so simple, so prodigious, at the same time

Incredible things are happening in the world

Magical things are happening in the world

Across the river there are all kinds of magical instruments

While we really keep on living like monkeys

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I haven't even heard the original of this song, but I think Iron & Wine do a beautiful job here. I was delightfully surprised to hear that the lyrics from this song apparently come from a short passage in the beginning of the book, One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (can't say about the title though). Jose Arcadia Buendia expresses his discontent with "living like donkeys," instead of monkeys in this case, in a tiny microcosm cut off from all the wonderful things going on in the rest of the world. I consider this book a classic for its enigmatic metaphors, magical realism, and general nonsensical tragedy and beauty. There is not much plot to speak of and it is a difficult read partially because of its breadth (yes, it covers a hundred years and many, many characters, some with very similar names) but also its very literal, allegorical style, reminding one a little of the Bible. Sounds a bit daunting but despite all that, when I read it, I could barely put it down!

Sucker for quotes

2009-12-12T12:16:00.004-06:00

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And twenty years from now you'll be more disappointed in the things that you didn't do than in the things that you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the tradewinds in your sail. Explore. Dream. Discover.

-- Mark Twain

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I'm such a sucker for quotes. Nothing like a few choice inspirational words to pick me up during finals week and make me realize that better days are ahead...(11 days from now!!)

Ralph Waldo Emerson

2009-12-02T21:36:00.005-06:00

The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make a difference that you have lived and lived well.

--Raph Waldo Emerson

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Amen!!

image source

Rest in peace, Daul Kim

2009-11-20T17:19:00.011-06:00

I honestly can't believe she is gone. When I found out, like 30 minutes ago, I was moved to tears. It was only yesterday, I went to her blog and played a track she had posted, a minimalist song by Jim Rivers, called I Go Deep. I have been reading her blog for almost two years, and somehow, in that time, I feel like I've gotten to know her, because she always wrote intimately about her struggles. When she wrote about feeling like she had no home and no identity, I could relate. I cut my bangs two years ago because of a picture I saw of her! I looked up to how much she had accomplished as a fellow 20-year-old, and was inspired by her independence and nonconformity. And now, all of a sudden, she is gone. At only 20 years old, with so much more to live for, so much creativity, individuality, beauty, and spunk...

Rest in peace...you will be missed.

her blog - iliketoforkmyself.blogspot.com

Also my 100th post...sob!

Timothy Dick - Florence

2009-11-08T17:05:00.004-06:00

Watch this video if you are alone in a dark room, lonely, nostalgic, or melancholy, and feel like slowly sinking into a deep and murky pit of emotions. Watch it if you have plenty of time to kill, or if you need a breather in between your many lives. To me, this song is so beautiful and heartfelt - Timothy Dick's voice is like that of an old world-weary man. It is almost eerie watching these faces and expressions and knowing that every person in the video is now probably no longer alive...paired with Timothy's achy, mumbling voice, there is both a sense of timelessness and fragility.

From the video: Music video for Timothy Dick's song "Florence". Timmy Gallogly made a collage of beautiful, forgotten public domain movies. Website- http://www.myspace.com/timothydick Buy the album- http://cdbaby.com/cd/timothydick or- itunes/rhapsody/whatever. May this be a friend to you in the dark.

New York, I Love You

2009-11-07T16:48:00.006-06:00

Image: Vogue 1958

I took my students on a trip in New York City yesterday, and it made me realize just how much it is a part of my dream to live there one day. Just as the chorus constantly reminds one in "Empire State of Mind," it represents a place to me where possibilities are endless and dreams are fulfilled - a place where there is no time to sleep or be bored, where there is always light, life, action, and things to do. I equate living in the city with being young, naïve, and restless. It is a city that pairs beauty and also ugliness in the same picture, that puts gritty realism down the block from airy escapism - danger, character, and adventure - all things I love as well. I know the picture I've built up in my head of the "city that never sleeps" is an unfounded stereotype, a dream or silly fantasy, but my dream is still to make NYC where I reside, work, and live to the fullest for most of my youngish adult life.

“ There are roughly three New Yorks. There is, first, the New York of the man or woman who was born here, who takes the city for granted and accepts its size and its turbulence as natural and inevitable. Second, there is the New York of the commuter — the city that is devoured by locusts each day and spat out each night. Third, there is the New York of the person who was born somewhere else and came to New York in quest of something. […] Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness; natives give it solidity and continuity; but the settlers give it passion.

- E.B. White, from Here is New York

feelin

2009-10-25T20:35:00.007-05:00

There is pleasure in the pathless woods;
There is a rapture on the lonely shore;
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but Nature more.
-Lord Byron

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Just Breathe - Telepopmusik

2009-10-17T14:01:00.002-05:00

I'm getting into lounge/house/minimal tech/whatever you call it music lately. I really enjoy the video of this song...way better than the original.

Zhang Xiao

2009-08-24T20:32:00.009-05:00

Photos by Chinese photographer Zhang Xiao - his website includes a collection on the Three Gorges Dam construction.

Fantasy

2009-08-16T13:35:00.011-05:00

Shirley Bassett - Love Story (Where Do I Begin) (Awayteam Remix)

This song conjures a lot of memories for me because it was a part of the playlist that was on rotation at the store I worked at this time last summer. It reminds me of closing nights: sweeping glossy wooden floors alone and in the odd sterile emptiness of a recently packed store, hearing the stomp of my heels reverberate in the brightly lit, minimally arranged rooms -- and then listening to this lady's voice fill the space of the walls, feeling lonely, longing, and full at the same time.

Friendly Fires - Paris ft. Au Revoir Simone (Aeroplane Remix)

A beautiful dream:

One day we're gonna live in Paris

I promise

I'm on it

When I'm bringing in the money

I promise

I'm on it

And every night we'll watch the stars

They'll be out for us

And every night, the city lights

They'll be out for us

Ponyo and all things Hayao Miyazaki

2009-08-14T19:00:00.009-05:00

Today the movie Ponyo comes out in wide theatres in America, under the flagship that is Disney. If you have never seen anything yet directed by Hayao Miyazaki, this is the perfect opportunity to do so! Honestly, forget any preconceived notions you may have about Japanese cartoons, cartoons, or even the movie genre of fantasy in general. His movies transcend any sort of box or category or stereotype you may want to put them in. Instead, they tell classic, complex, and often fantastic stories that respect the audience as intelligent, well-rounded people instead of spoonfeeding them clichéd truisms or sugar-coated, throw-up-inducing platitudes - something really, really lacking in today's world of loud, glitzy, repetitive, crass, and stupid movies.

Characters have strength, subtlety, and depth; they show growth and development; they are neither good nor bad; they are REAL. They live in worlds full of shades of gray, where their actions have consequences, and what is "right" is not always clear or easy - much like the world we live in now.

Though there are hard questions asked, neither are his movies cynical - another all-too-often-included characteristic of a "smart/realistic movie". Quite the opposite in fact - though troubles may abound and there are no clear solutions, his worlds are still full of wonder, mystery, and especially hope.

Last, and certainly not least, his movies are visually astounding in terms of detail and animation, as well as aesthetics and the breadth and beauty of his landscapes. They give perfect illumination to mythical worlds and creatures that are unimaginable to the common mind.

If you haven't seen it yet, I also urge you to also rent his movie Spirited Away (also released under Disney), as I think it is more accessible to an American audience with a predilection for animated movies that are cute (not that it is excessively cute, just that it is a coming-of-age story without really dark themes). The visuals are breathtaking, the story uplifting, and the many characters and personalities are fantastic, bizarre, even sometimes a little grotesque.

After that, do yourself a favor and watch Princess Mononoke. This is my favorite of his movies (so far!) as well as one of my favorite movies of all time because of its probing into real-world issues, such as the horrors of war, the inability for people get along or share, our inherent limits on resources, power and corruption, industrialization and man's imprint upon nature, etc., etc. Still within these grim topics are scenes of wonder and beauty - and of course, hope (though the ending doesn't exactly give us easy solutions).

My hope is that, because of its wide release, Ponyo will be seen by many people who have no idea who Hayao Miyazaki is. Honestly, he deserves to be a household name in America, and with time, I also hope more audiences will enjoy his movies, and more movie-makers will learn from his example.

Don't believe me? Rotten Tomatoes lists 10 of his movies with the highest ratings - the lowest of the 10 is at 86% and three of them are at 100%. Looks like Ponyo (currently at 95%) will become one of them.

Make way for a breezier summer

2009-08-13T21:09:00.007-05:00

I am going back to NJ in a week and am anticipating a much cooler, breezier summer than the one I am having now in Texas (100's and sunny everyday!) And so this playlist is for the breezy moments - driving with the windows down, taking a walk in an airy forest, house cleaning, admiring dusky skies on the beach, flying a kite on a hill, or maybe just waking up bleary-eyed.

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Aphex Twin - Film

This song came on while I was driving and inspired this playlist

The Soiree - Across the Sea

The Radio Dept. - Sleeping In

I think the entire Pet Grief album could be a on a breezy summer playlist.

Mazarin - Another Goes By

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Lots of light, synth, and pop...I guess I'm going for that hazy, half-baked feel.

Resignation by Nikki Giovanni

2009-08-10T00:44:00.005-05:00

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Resignation

by Nikki Giovanni

I love you
because the earth turns round the sun
because the North wind blows north
sometimes
because the Pope is Catholic
and most Rabbis Jewish
because winters flow into springs
and the air clears after a storm
because only my love for you
despite the charms of gravity
keeps me from falling off this Earth
into another dimension
I love you
because it is the natural order of things

I love you
like the habit I picked up in college
of sleeping through lectures
or saying I’m sorry
when I get stopped for speeding
because I drink a glass of water
in the morning
and chain-smoke cigarettes
all through the day
because I take my coffee Black
and my milk with chocolate
because you keep my feet warm
though my life a mess
I love you
because I don’t want it
any other way.

I am helpless
in my love for you
It makes me so happy
to hear you call my name
I am amazed you can resist
locking me in an echo chamber
where your voice reverberates
through the four walls
sending me into spasmatic ecstasy
I love you
because it’s been so good
for so long
that if I didn’t love you
I’d have to be born again
and that is not a theological statement
I am pitiful in my love for you

The Dells tell me Love
is so simple
the thought though of you
sends indescribably delicious multitudinous
thrills throughout and through-in my body
I love you
because no two snowflakes are alike
and it is possible
if you stand tippy-toe
to walk between the raindrops
I love you
because I am afraid of the dark
and can’t sleep in the light
because I rub my eyes
when I wake up in the morning
and find you there
because you with all your magic powers were
determined that
I should love you
because there was nothing for you but that
I would love you

I love you
because you made me
want to love you
more than I love my privacy
my freedom my commitments
and responsibilities
I love you ’cause I changed my life
to love you
because you saw me one Friday
afternoon and decided that I would
love you
I love you I love you I love you

-----------------------------------

Nikki Giovanni is currently teaching English at Virginia Tech. Visit her website here.

The trail of my cruise ship to Alaska

2009-08-08T00:52:00.007-05:00

Everybody wants to look forward, but it's nice to look back every now and then.

Heading out to open water.

Leaving the bay and retracing our route south.

Family vacations

2009-07-28T01:35:00.004-05:00

On a trip right now to Vancouver and Whistler, Canada, heading to a cruise to Alaska next week!

Waking Life Chapter 13 - Dreamers

2009-07-24T13:04:00.009-05:00

One of my favorite passages in Waking Life:

So I just watched this for the first time last night. I think that it's a great movie not so much because of what happens and what people say and etc., but because it is an intelligent movie that challenges you to think, play close attention, rewatch, discuss, form your own opinions...

-----------------------

Carpe diem! It's an idea so easy to agree with, romanticize, be swept up in, get carried away with....but so hard to implement day in and day out.

So whatever you do, don't be bored. This is absolutely the most exciting time we could have possibly hoped to be alive.

Believe it!!

xkcd I love you

2009-07-17T00:35:00.009-05:00

XKCD.com

Midsummer

2009-07-12T23:36:00.010-05:00

(around) Midsummer update:

Back in Texas, and it's been over 100 everyday so far. I'm so glad to be home though. I think I've said this before, but it always gets me to come home after 6 months of college and see my ten-year-old sister look noticably taller than when I left her. Makes me wonder what else I've missed.

I've recently started watercoloring some of my paper creations. This is, as far as I can find out, known as a "compound of 5 tetrahedrons," and took me at least a good week of work to make. My 5-intersecting tetrahedra and buckyball are going under the brush next! After that I would like to tackle this... but I'm afraid summer will probably be over already.

As for finally having the leisure to read again, I have finished Pale Fire by Nabokov, The Sorrows of Young Werther by Goethe, and am partially through The Trial by Kafka. Quick thoughts: not really sure what to make of Pale Fire - I read some different criticism claiming this is real and that is imaginary and this person is actually that person and vice versa, so am thoroughly confuddled but enjoyed it nonetheless...probably it needs a course to really digest it properly; Werther is a ridiculous and selfish man - if I were Lotte, I'd say to him, "If you really love me as you claim to do, why do you make me so unhappy by your actions?" because as far as I see it, his love for her is rooted in himself and not for her at ALL; so far of Kafka's, I am rather unhappy with the way K/Kafka treats women in this novel, also I think K is rather stupid with his decisions in going about things or perhaps I'm too used to our more modern justice system!

I miss the cats!

A Color of the Sky

2009-07-04T15:49:00.005-05:00

from Vogue Italia

--------------------------------------

A Color of the Sky

by Tony Hoagland

Windy today and I feel less than brilliant,
driving over the hills from work.
There are the dark parts on the road
when you pass through clumps of wood
and the bright spots where you have a view of the ocean,
but that doesn’t make the road an allegory.

I should call Marie and apologize
for being so boring at dinner last night,
but can I really promise not to be that way again?
And anyway, I’d rather watch the trees, tossing
in what certainly looks like sexual arousal.

Otherwise it’s spring, and everything looks frail;
the sky is baby blue, and the just-unfurling leaves
are full of infant chlorophyll,
the very tint of inexperience.

Last summer’s song is making a comeback on the radio,
and on the highway overpass,
the only metaphysical vandal in America has written
MEMORY LOVES TIME
in big black spraypaint letters,

which makes us wonder if Time loves Memory back.

Last night I dreamed of X again.
She’s like a stain on my subconscious sheets.
Years ago she penetrated me
but though I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed,
I never got her out,
but now I’m glad.

What I thought was an end turned out to be a middle.
What I thought was a brick wall turned out to be a tunnel.
What I thought was an injustice
turned out to be a color of the sky.

Outside the youth center, between the liquor store
and the police station,
a little dogwood tree is losing its mind;

overflowing with blossomfoam,
like a sudsy mug of beer;
like a bride ripping off her clothes,

dropping snow white petals to the ground in clouds,

so Nature’s wastefulness seems quietly obscene.
It’s been doing that all week:
making beauty,
and throwing it away,
and making more.

from here.

-------------------------

It's been beautiful everyday here - going to the beach again today to hopefully catch the sunset and then watch fireworks over the water. Happy 4th of July!

Summer Soundtrack

2009-06-18T17:10:00.006-05:00

This is my soundtrack for the summer.

The Harlem Shakes - Sunlight

Sunlight, sunlight baby/we just let go of the night now slowly/we won't dance, we won't sing, we won't talk/we just gonna watch how it bends

Let's squeeze as much as we can out of this summer. Let's lie on the dewy grass and watch the light from the sun fade from yellow to rose to nothing, so slowly you can see the individual rays bend. Let's drive all night through walls of fog until we see the sunrise reflecting off the road in the distance, ever so slowly clearing the mist. We'll watch the reflections of the beams of light on the water in the air, hold hands, and let time seep thickly by like molasses filling a jar.

Animal Collective - In the Flowers

If I could just leave my body for the night.../Then we could be dancing/No more missing you while I'm gone/There we could be dancing/And you'd smile and say, "I like this song"/And when our eyes will meet there/We will recognize nothing's wrong

Let's squeeze as much as we can out of this summer. Let's fill our moments to bursting with joy, love, ecstasy, madness, energy, and emotion; let's spend our days living in the seconds that we are laughing, crying, dancing, yelling, jumping, and singing. We'll dance all night until we can't feel our backs or knees anymore and we'll scream and sing until it hurts. Time will fly by us in a burst of flame, burning brightly and beautifully, but leaving so quickly that we won't remember anything that happened, just a faint feeling of bliss.

cats

2009-05-15T19:38:00.006-05:00

So, I'm obsessed with cats. Most especially my two cats, Cashew and Noob Saibot. Cashew is basically my baby, because he loves falling asleep cradled in my chest, though he's getting a little chubby, so it's a little hard for me to breathe when he does this now. He's also spoiled, making him crabby as hell when he doesn't get his way. Noobie, on the other hand, is loveable and cute, but more independent because he is also a killing machine (a.k.a. ninja) - agile, stealthy, lethal, and curious about everything. Because I love them so much, I've taken to photographing them a lot. I'm totally amateur, but it's just so much fun!

Allow me an entry where I revert back to childhood

2009-05-12T15:02:00.003-05:00

The Sound of Arrows - M.A.G.I.C. (Mini-video) from The Sound of Arrows on Vimeo.

The Sound of Arrows - M.A.G.I.C. (full version)